The group also conducts path-breaking research on humanitarian logistics, an area of profound human impact, to determine the most effective ways to conduct post-disaster humanitarian logistics. The research on humanitarian logistics taps into the knowledge of social sciences to build more realistic mathematical models of humanitarian logistics. The transportation group has pioneered the multidisciplinary study of post-disaster humanitarian logistic operations and has: identified the key lessons learned from the response to the largest disasters of recent times; translated these lessons into actionable policy recommendations; and shared these suggestions with disaster response agencies. As part of the field work, this research group has conducted detailed analyses of the most prominent disasters of recent times, including Hurricane Katrina, the Port-au-Prince earthquake, the tornadoes in Joplin and Alabama, Hurricane Irene, and the Tohoku disasters in Japan.