Visiting Scientist
Fluminense Federal University -Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
nunocrokidakis@id.uff.br
Room 03.326 | Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg. FAU DCN-AvH Chair for Dynamics, Control, Machine Learning and Numerics – Alexander von Humboldt Professorship.
+49 9131 85-67133
My research is focused on the modeling of complex systems. In other words, my interest is the study of systems constituted by a large number of units that interact under certain rules. As examples, we can cite the neurons in the brain, spins in a magnetic system, agents in the stock market, proteins in a metabolic network, individuals with distinct opinions in a group or population, cars in roads, and many others. It is an interdisciplinary research field whose aim is to explain the behavior of macroscopic systems by studying the statistical properties of their microscopic constituents. In analogy with the standard Statistical Physics, in those systems it is common the occurrence of long-range correlations, power laws and order-disorder phase transitions. The research topic I am more interested in the last years is the modeling of Social Phenomena. The relation of these systems with the traditional Physics is not restricted to the occurrence of Critical Phenomena. Just as Statistical Physics models explain how a collection of atoms can exhibit the correlated behavior necessary to produce a ferromagnet, Social Science models wish to explain interdependent behaviors. The basic idea in Statistical Physics – that the behavior of one atom is influenced by the behavior of other atoms – is thus similar to the social science claim that one individual’s decisions depend upon the decisions of others; therein lies the possibility of a common mathematical and/or computational structure.
