Mikhail Davidson

Biography

Mikhail Davidson graduated from the Moscow State University, Faculty of Computational Math &  Cybernetics in 1992. After graduation he worked as a researcher at the Computing Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences, where he also defended Ph.D. in Mathematical Sciences. His PhD thesis was devoted to a study of stability properties of solution sets of a special class of multi commodity flow problems. Numerical methods of optimization are also an area of Mikhail’s research interests. These were the subject of the training programs in which he participated in the Weizmann Institute of Science (Israel, 1994, research group of A. Brandt),International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis (Austria, 1996, supervisor Prof. A. Ruszczynski) and of his postdoctoral program at the University of Trier (Germany, 1997, supervisor Prof. R. Tichatschke). In 2000, Mikhail joined Carana Corp. where he continues to work today. Carana was the strategic consultant to RAO UES (Russian power energy monopoly) supporting the reform of the Russian power energy sector in 2000 – 2008.  One of the goals of the reform was to implant the market-based competitive environment in the process of production and consumption of the electric energy in Russian Federation. Mikhail got actively involved in the process of the reform and ultimately became one of the lead technical experts behind it. His major responsibilities were focused on development of the mathematical model and software for the day-ahead and balancing markets. Later on, Mikhail was involved in resolving multiple operational challenges of the new market – thus gaining unique practical experience and understanding of the sector specifics. Mikhail keeps working on improving the system. This work includes posing and resolving multiple outstanding research challenges, such as developing pricing mechanisms for unit commitment, increasing reliability of computations of time critical market applications (such as balancing market) which is, in fact, the main focus of Mikhail’s current research efforts documented in a number of papers he has published or submitted to international peer-reviewed journals.

Research Interest

Energy System