Abstract: Operational research is a science of technology that adopts analysis, test and quantification methods to make a comprehensive arrangement of the limited resources to realize an efficient operation of a practical system. It can be used to forecast a development trend, formulate an action standard or optimize a feasible plan. Mine ventilation system is a complex one composed of crisscross shafts and tunnels and is a general term for ventilation network, ventialation power and ventilation structures. The ventilation network is an abstract description of the ventilation by points, lines and attributes. In light of the real ventilation conditions in the mining production, the air flow in the ventilation system can be classified into natural air flow, restricted air flow and semi-restricted air flow. Of them, the natural air flow generally  can not provide sufficient wind volume for mining and therefore, restricted air flow and semi-restricted air flow are used in most of the mine ventilation systems. We apply the operational research in the mine ventilation system mainly for the linear programming of the restricted air flow, non-linear programming of the semi-restricted air flow and network analysis and simulation to find the best solution.

Key words: Mine ventilation system, Operational research, Optimization, Ventilation system