Nominations/submissions are invited for the Best Paper Prize for Young Researchers. The submitted papers should be in the area of continuous optimization and satisfy at least one of the following three criteria:

• Passed the first round of a normal refereeing process in a journal;

• Published during the year 2021 or after;

• Certified by a thesis advisor or postdoctoral mentor as a well-polished paper that is ready for submission to a journal.

Papers can either be single-authored or multi-authored, subject to the following criteria:

• Each paper must have at least one author who was less than 30 years of age on January 1, 2020 or had not earned a Ph.D. before that date.

• Only authors satisfying at least one of these conditions (i.e., the age criterion and Ph.D. criterion) may be considered for the prize.

• In case of joint authorship involving senior researchers (i.e., those who do not satisfy both the age criterion and Ph.D. criterion), one senior author must certify the contribution of the nominated author(s) in the work.

A selection committee will decide on questions concerning eligibility in exceptional cases. The selection criteria will be based solely on the quality of the paper, including originality of results and potential impact. The following items are required for a valid nomination/submission:

1.  The paper under consideration;

2.  A brief description of the contribution (limited to 2 pages);

3.  A statement on the status of the paper: published in a journal, accepted, under review, or not submitted. In the latter case, a statement by a thesis advisor or postdoctoral mentor on the readiness for submission of the paper should be included;

4.  A certification of the qualifying author’s eligibility in terms of age or Ph.D. (by the qualifying author’s adviser or department chair);

5.  In case of joint authorship involving a senior researcher, a certification from the senior researcher that provides some detail regarding the contribution to the work by the qualifying author.

When and how to submit. The deadline for submission is January 15, 2025. Submissions should be sent electronically in PDF format to the Chair of the Selection Committee, Dr. Uday V. Shanbhag, at iccopt25.young.research.comp@gmail.com. The Selection Committee members include

• Uday V. Shanbhag, Chair (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor)

• Guzin Bayraksan (Ohio State University)

• Radu Ioan Bot (University of Vienna)

• Coralia Cartis (University of Oxford)

• Zhaosong Lu (University of Minnesota)

• Mathias Staudigl (University of Mannheim)

• Ting Kei Pong (Hong Kong Polytechnic University)

We encourage submissions that either reside within the existing sub-areas of continuous optimization (CO) or may examine novel questions in emerging areas beyond the traditional topics of CO but leverage, inform, and expand research in CO. The latter could include but are not restricted to the following: (i) interplay between discrete and continuous problems; (ii) settings complicated by the presence of dynamics captured possibly by PDEs; and (iii) optimization for data science. The committee has also been afforded the option of bringing in ad-hoc reviewers if necessary.

Up to three papers will be selected as finalists of the competition. The finalists will be featured in a dedicated session at ICCOPT 2025, and the winner will be determined after this session. The finalists are still allowed to give another talk in the conference if they wish to do so.

The winner of the Young Researcher Prize will be announced at the conference dinner and presented with a 1000 USD award. All finalists will receive free admission to the conference dinner and a certificate.

Finally, we would like to highlight the following important point:

Any communication with committee members about the competition should be restricted to inquiries regarding the submission status. Attempting to influence committee members in any way may lead to disqualification.