This is an archived course. A more recent version may be available at ocw.mit.edu.

Game Theory and Mechanism Design

As taught in: Spring 2005

A photograph of a chess board.

Game theory is the study of strategic interactions between intelligent rational decision-makers. Chess is an application of game theory. (Image courtesy of Daniel Bersak.)

Instructors:

Prof. Asu Ozdaglar

MIT Course Number:

6.972

Level:

Graduate

Course Features

Course Description

This course is offered to graduates and is an introduction to fundamentals of game theory and mechanism design with motivations drawn from various applications including distributed control of wireline and wireless communication networks, incentive-compatible/dynamic resource allocation, and pricing. Emphasis is placed on the foundations of the theory, mathematical tools, as well as modeling and the equilibrium notions in different environments. Topics covered include: normal form games, learning in games, supermodular games, potential games, dynamic games, subgame perfect equilibrium, bargaining, repeated games, auctions, mechanism design, cooperative game theory, network and congestion games, and price of anarchy.