Abstract:Operations Research(OR) is an interdisciplinary subject emerged in 1930s.It mainly studies how to make optimal or satisfactory solutions through mathematical and computational theories and methods for social and engineering systems.In this paper,we first summarize the features and methodology of OR and make a brief review on the development of OR.Then,we survey the status of some main directions of this discipline along with some its typical open problems.In the end of the survey we prospect for the trend of OR in the future.