DIEP talk: Casper van Elteren

The following seminar session of DIEP (Dutch Institute for Emergent Phenomena) might be of interest to the LIRa audience.

Date and time: Thursday, June 10th 2021, 11:00-12:30, Amsterdam time.

Speaker: Casper van Elteren (UvA)

Title: Through the looking glass  – Information flows in complex systems
Abstract:
Understanding dynamical systems  is a fundamental problem for the 21st century. Despite the prima facie differences  and purposes of many real-world networks, previous research shows several universal characteristics in networks properties such as the small-world phenomenon, fat-tail degree and feedback loops. This has led to the common but  often implicit assumption that the connectedness  of a node in  the network is proportional  to its dynamic importance.  For example in epidemic  research, high  degree nodes  or “super-spreaders”  are associated  to dominant  epidemic risk and  therefore deserve  special attention. Yet  prior research shows that the shared universality in network characteristics  is not shared in the dynamic or functional properties of many real-world systems.

In  this  talk I  will  explore  the  relation  between local  interactions  and
macroscopic properties of  a system through the lens of  statistical physics and information theory. In particular, I will  show novel methods on determining the so-called driver node  in complex systems, and how tipping points can be studied from an information theoretical perspective.  (website + slides: https://cvanelteren.github.io/talk/diep2021/)