Laura Vargas Koch

Laura Vargas Koch is an Associate Professor for Algorithmic Game Theory and Discrete Mathematics at RWTH Aachen University's GDM (Games and Discrete Mathematics) department. Her research focuses on approximation algorithms, dynamic routing games, and optimization in flow problems. She holds a PhD from RWTH Aachen under Britta Peis and has held postdoctoral positions at ETH Zurich, CMM in Santiago de Chile, and was a Bonn Junior Fellow at the Hausdorff Center for Mathematics. She teaches courses such as 'Selected Topics in Discrete Mathematics' and 'Algorithmic Game Theory'.

• Education: PhD in Discrete Mathematics (RWTH Aachen, Britta Peis)

Her research interests emphasize algorithmic approaches to dynamic systems and game-theoretic network models. Recent work explores convergence properties of routing equilibria and spillback effects in traffic networks. She actively contributes to conferences such as SAGT, APPROX, and EC, and organizes events like the Dagstuhl seminar on Dynamic Traffic Models. She co-hosted the podcast 'Algo2Go' to popularize algorithmic topics during the pandemic.

Publications span theoretical computer science and operations research, with notable contributions on planar graph flows and Nash flow dynamics over time.