Date: 2 July, 16h (CET, GMT+2, Barcelona/Madrid/Paris/Berlin)

Speaker: Alex Arenas, DEIM, Universitat Rovira i Virgili​

Title:  “Epidemics and mobility”

Link to the webinar: https://eu.bbcollab.com/guest/8c04df402c3e4422a66fd1133249678b

Abstract: 

Reaction–diffusion processes have been widely used to study epidemics in networked metapopulations. In the context of epidemics, reaction processes are understood as contagions within each subpopulation (patch), while diffusion represents the mobility of individuals between patches. Recently, the characteristics of human mobility, such as its recurrent nature, have been proven crucial to understand the phase transition to endemic epidemic states. Here, we present a framework able to cope with the elementary epidemic processes, the spatial distribution of populations and the commuting mobility patterns. We will show after, how this framework has been adapted to describe the COVID-19 pandemic.

Date: 25 June, 16h (CET, GMT+2, Barcelona/Madrid/Paris/Berlin)

Speaker: Santiago F. Elena, Institute for Integrative Systems Biology, CSIC​

Title: "Why some patients develop a severe syndrome while other remain asymptomatic? Early-warning signals associated with the phase transition from health to disease."

You can see the webinar here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IMY08wJQndU&list=PLf7A47_ENtnLkXJ8QPspRIT5a0zz-1nPd&index=6

Abstract: One of the most outstanding observations during COVID-19 pandemics is that some patients have an asymptomatic infection while others suffer severe symptoms, some of them becoming fatal. Is there any relation between the global gene expression state of patients and they propensity to suffer an asymptomatic infection? Is it possible to identify which genes, or groups of them within a regulation network, may serve as markers to predict the clinical fate of a patient before the presence of any symptom? In this seminar I will introduce the fundamentals of the theory of Dynamical Biomarkers of Networks (DBN), illustrating their application to the analysis of transcriptomic data during disease progression in a pathosystem model.

Títol: "Perquè alguns pacients desenvolupen símptomes severs mentre uns altres són asimptomàtics? Biomarcadors d'una transició de fase associada a la progressió de la malaltia”

Resum: Una de les observacions més destacables fetes durant l'epidèmia de la COVID-19 és que alguns pacients passen la infecció de manera asimptomàtica mentre que uns altres pateixen símptomes severs que en un percentatge de casos tenen un desenllaç fatal.  Existeix alguna associació entre l'estat d'expressió gènica global dels pacients i la seua propensió a patir una infecció asimptomàtica?  És possible identificar quins gens, o grups d'ells en una xarxa de regulació, servirien de marcadors per a predir el destí clínic d'un pacient abans que mostre cap símptoma?  En aquesta xarrada presentaré els fonaments de la  teoria dels biomarcadors dinàmics de xarxes (DNB) i il·lustraré la seua aplicació a l'anàlisi de dades transcriptòmics presos al llarg de la progressió de la malaltia en un patosistema model.

https://eu.bbcollab.com/guest/03d4a446deec472f9f729071b7292d63

Date: 18 June, 16h (CET, GMT+2, Barcelona/Madrid/Paris/Berlin)

Speaker: Nuria Oliver, Data-Pop Alliance & ELLIS

Title: "Data Science to fight against COVID-19"

You can see the webinar here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0C7PoVf2QNY&list=PLf7A47_ENtnLkXJ8QPspRIT5a0zz-1nPd&index=6&t=0s

Abstract: 

In my talk, I will describe the work that we have done within the Commission on AI and COVID-19 for the President of the Valencian Region. As commissioner, I have led a multi-disciplinary team of 20+ scientists who have volunteered since March 2020. We have been working on 4 large areas: (1) human mobility modeling; (2) computational epidemiological models (both metapopulation and individual models); (3) predictive models; (4) citizen surveys (https://covid19impactsurvey.org)

I will describe the results that we have produced in each of these areas and will share the lessons learned in this very special initiative of collaboration between the civil society at large (through the survey), the scientific community (through the Expert Group) and a public administration (through the Commissioner at the Presidency level)

Short Biography

Nuria Oliver, is Chief Data Scientist at Data-Pop Alliance, Chief Scientific Advisor at the Vodafone Institute and co-founder of ELLIS (The European Laboratory for Learning and Intelligent Systems).  Since March 2020, she has been appointed Commissioner for the President of the Valencian Region on AI Strategy and Data Science applied to the fight against COVID-19. As part of her work as commissioner, she is leading a team of over 20 scientists working on large-scale human mobility modeling, computational epidemiological modeling and data science to answer public policy questions. As part of this work, she has launched the https://covid19impactsurvey.org, one of the largest anonymous citizens’ surveys to date related to COVID-19, with over 230,000 answers.

She is a Telecommunications Engineer from the UPM and holds a PhD in Artificial Intelligence from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). 

She has over 25 years of research experience in the areas of human behavior modeling and prediction from data and human-computer interaction. She has been a researcher at Microsoft Research (Redmond, WA), the first female Scientific Director at Telefonica R&D for over 8 years and the first Director of Research in Data Science at Vodafone globally (2017-2019).

Her work in the computational modeling of human behavior using Artificial Intelligence techniques, human-computer interaction, mobile computing and Big Data analysis - especially for the Social Good is well known with over 160 scientific publications that have received more than 17800 citationsand a ten best paper award nominations and awards. She is co-inventor of over 40 filed patents and she is a regular keynote speaker at international conferences.  Her work has contributed to the improvement of services, the creation of new services, the definition of business strategies and the creation of new companies.

Nuria is the only Spanish researcher recognized by the ACM as Distinguished Scientist (2015) and Fellow (2017) at the same time. She is also a Fellow of the IEEE (2017) and the European Association for Artificial Intelligence (2016). She has received an Honorary Doctorate from the Miguel Hernandez University (2018). Dr. Oliver is the youngest and fourth female member of the Spanish Royal Academy of Engineering (2018) and an elected member of the Academia Europaea (2016) and CHI Academy (2018), where she is the only Spanish scientist.

As an advisor, Dr. Oliver is a member of the scientific advisory committee of several European universities, the Gadea Ciencia Foundation, Mahindra Comviva and the Future Digital Society, among others. In addition, she advises the Government of the Valencia Community, Spain and the European Commission on issues related to Artificial Intelligence. She is a member of a Global Future Council at the World Economic Forum. She is an independent member of the board of Bankia. 

Dr. Oliver is a member of the program committee of the main international congresses in her research areas. She has also been a member of the organizing committee of 19 international conferences and is a member of the editorial committee of five international magazines.

Dr. Oliver's work has been recognized internationally with numerous awards. She graduated top of her class at the UPM and received the First National Telecommunications Award (1004). She is the first Spanish scientist to receive the MIT TR100 (today TR35) Young Innovator Award (2004) and the Rising Talent award by the Women’s Forum for the Economy and Society (2009). She has been awarded Data Scientist of the Year in Europe (2019), Engineer of the Year Award by the COIT (2018), the Medal for Business and Social Merit by the Valencian Government (2018), the European Digital Woman of the Year award (2016) and the Spanish National Computer Science Angela Robles Award (2016).

She has been named one of the top 11 Artificial Intelligence influencers worldwide by Pioneering Minds (2017), one of Spanish wonderful minds in technology by EL PAIS newspaper (2017), “an outstanding female director in technology” (El PAIS, 2012), one of “100 leaders for the future” (Capital, 2009) and one of the “40 youngsters who will mark the next millennium” (El PAIS, 1999).

Nuria firmly believes in the value of technology to improve the quality of people, both individually and collectively, and dedicates her professional life to achieving it.

Her passion is to improve people’s quality of life, both individually and collectively, through technology. She is also passionate about scientific outreach. Hence, she regularly collaborates with the media (press, radio, TV) and gives non-technical talks about science and technology to broad audiences, and particularly to teenagers, with a special interest on girls. She has given talks to more than 10,000 adolescents, has contributed to the book "Digital natives do not exist" (Deusto, 2017) with the chapter "Digital scholars", has written articles for EL PAIS, The Guardian, TechCrunch among others and has been co -organizer of large congresses with thousands of attendees, such as the first TEDxBarcelona event dedicated to emerging education, the I and II International Congress on Artificial Intelligence and the I International Congress on Aging. Her talks on WIRED, TEDx and similar events have been viewed thousands of times.

Twitter: @nuriaoliver

URL: http://www.nuriaoliver.com   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuria_Oliver

http://ubics.ub.edu/

Speaker: Manlio de Domenico, CoMuNe Lab, Fondazione Bruno Kessler

Title: "Tackling complexity: foundations and applications"

Abstract: 

Complex systems consists of units whose interactions at a microscopic scale lead to the spontaneous emergence of collective behavior and other unexpected phenomena at the meso- and macroscale. In this seminar I will introduce some basic concepts and tools of complexity science without relying on technicalities.
In the second part of the seminar I will briefly discuss the relevance of big data for the analysis of complex systems and, more specifically, of socio-technical systems, spanning from the rise of collective attention to one of the most relevant phenomena observed during the COVID-19 pandemic: the infodemic related to coronavirus.

Link to the webinar:  https://eu.bbcollab.com/guest/995d03a3a751431fbc3f4999aa88e8b7

https://eu.bbcollab.com/guest/995d03a3a751431fbc3f4999aa88e8b7

ATENCIÓ: WORKSHOP CANCEL·LAT!! 

ATTENTION: WORKSHOP CANCELED!!

Degut a les cancel·lacions dels vols dels speakers internacionals. 

Due to travel cancellations of invited international speakers.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Complexity Science and Social Systems

Date: 23 March 2020

Time: 9:45 - 12:00

Venue: UB main building, Gran Via, Sala de Professors, 5a planta de l’Edifici Josep Carner, Fac. Filologia i Comunicació (entering by C/ Aribau gate)

Presenters:

Null models for public opinion dynamics

Dr Chico Camargo (Oxford Internet Institute, University of Oxford)

Formalising a hypothesis: agent-based model for studying agricultural sustainability in prehistoric Estonia

Andres Kimber (Institute of History and Archaeology, University of Tartu)

Bridging disciplinary silos in social systems' research: your questions/my questions, your methodology/my methodology

Dr Sergi Lozano (School of Economics, University of Barcelona)

Modelling synaptic plasticity deficits using a Moran process model

Dr Yayoi Teramoto Kimura (Oxford Policy Engagement Network, Royal Society)

About complexity science and social systems

How can complexity science help us better understand past and present complex social systems as diverse as online social networks or the Roman economy? This half-day workshop will explore the role complexity science, and in particular its use of network approaches, can play for the study of the human present and past.

Complexity science is now a thriving field and its application for the study of the human past shows huge potential. This workshop will explore this potential.

Minicurs de Xarxes Complexes per alumnes de Grau i Master (preferentment).

• Introducció a les Xarxes Complexes. Exemples. Models bàsics.

Dia: 12 de febrer (13:30-15h)  Professora: Maria Àngels Serrano

• Fonaments teòrics. Teoria de Xarxes Complexes.

Dia: 19 de febrer (13:30-15h) Professor: Marián Boguñá

• Aspectes computacionals. Repositoris de Dades. Python.

Dia: 26 de febrer (13:30-15h) Professor: Albert Diaz-Guilera

• Aplicacions amb dades experimentals. Interpretació. Gephi.

Dia: 4 de març (13:30-15h) Professor: Jordi Soriano

Inscripció i més informació del curs: https://ubics.ub.edu/mini_curs_xarxes

https://ubics83.wixsite.com/minicursxarxes

El 11 Febrer es celebrarà el Dia Internacional de les Dones i les Nenes en la Ciència amb l'Acte "Dones en la recerca científica" a l' Aula Enric Cassases de les Facultats de Física i Química de 15-17:30h.

Programa

15:00-16:00 Seminari a càrrec de Dra. Roberta Sinatra (Assistant professor, ITU Copenhagen)

Title: Quantifying the biases of scientific success

Abstract: Performance, also referred to as quality of fitness, represents the objective achievements of an individual, like the winning record of an athlete or the body of work of a scientist. In contrast, success, also referred to as impact, popularity, or visibility, is a collective phenomenon, indicating a community’s reaction to an individual’s performance. Why is the difference between performance and success important? Because in many areas of human activity, we often rely on success to measure performance - especially in science, where citations and visibility are constantly used to gauge quality, to assign recognition, and to allocate resources. Yet, success is strongly susceptible to effects that have NOTHING to do with performance, like gender or reputation. In this talk, we study success and impact in science, and ask: What is the role of luck in achieving high impact? What is the effect of gender and reputation on success? Can we model the different career evolution of male and female scientists? Based on the premise that success is a collective phenomenon, we use the tools of network science, data science, and computational social science to provide quantitative answers to these questions. 

Bio: Roberta Sinatra is Assistant Professor at IT University of Copenhagen, and holds visiting positions at ISI (Turin, Italy) and Complexity Science Hub (Vienna, Austria). Her research is at the forefront of network science, data science and computational social science. Currently, she spends particular attention on the analysis and modeling of dynamics that lead to the collective phenomenon of success, with focus on science and art, and on data-for-good applications. Roberta completed her undergraduate and graduate studies in Physics at the University of Catania, Italy, and was first a postdoctoral fellow, then a research faculty at the Center for Complex Network Research of Northeastern University (Boston MA, USA). Her research has been published in general audience journals such as Nature and Science, and has been featured in The New York Times, Forbes, The Economist, The Guardian, The Washington Post, among other major media outlets.

16:00-17:00 Debat amb les ponents:

Dra. Roberta Sinatra (Assistant professor, ITU Copenhagen)

Dra. Joaquina Álvarez Marrón (CSIC-Jaume Almera)

Dra. Núria Salan Ballesteros (UPC)

 17:00 Cafè

Organitzadors: (ordre alfabètic) Facultat de Biologia Facultat de Física Facultat de Ciències de la Terra Facultat de Química Institut de Ciències del Cosmos Universitat de Barcelona (ICCUB) Institut of Complex Systems-Universitat de Barcelona (UBICS) Institut de Nanociència i Nanotecnologia (IN2UB) Institut de Recerca de l'Aigua-Universitat de Barcelona (IdRA) Institut de Recerca GEOMODELS The Institute of Theoretical and Computational Chemistry of the Universitat de Barcelona (IQTCUB)

El 14 de Novembre de 2019 l'UBICS participarà a la Setmana de la Ciència seguint el següent programa: 

• "Xarxes complexes per a tothom"

10:30 a 11:00 Xerrada introductòria, a càrrec de Albert Diaz-Guilera (Director de l’Institut):

El nostre món esdevé cada dia més connectat a través de xarxes que permeten una comunicació instantània i la difusió d'informació. Al mateix temps, el grau en què la gent conegui aquestes xarxes jugarà un rol important a l'hora de determinar el benefici d'aquesta creixent connectivitat en la societat. En poques paraules, una societat connectada ha de conèixer com i perquè es dóna aquesta connectivitat: el coneixement bàsic de com les xarxes poden ser usades com una eina per descobrir i prendre decisions, conèixer els seus potencials beneficis i possibles punts febles, així com fer-lo més accessible als habitants d'aquest món cada cop més connectat. Us convidem a una sessió interactiva on veureu algunes característiques matemàtiques senzilles de les xarxes.

• " Simulacions de Sistemes Complexos"

11:00 a 11:30 Taller on es mostrarà de forma molt didàctica diverses simulacions que ens faran entendre millor el mon dels Sistemes Complexos. Pots trobar-ho aquí.

• " Visites a Laboratoris"

A continuació es visitaran els laboratoris dels investigadors en la ciència dels Sistemes Complexos.

11:30 a 12:00 Laboratori de neurofísica (Jordi Soriano-Fradera): https://www.sorianolab.eu/

12:00 a 12:30 Laboratori de materials, transicions de fase i sistemes multiescala (Eduard Vives).

Més informació:

- Complexifica: http://ubics.ub.edu/complexifica/index.html

- Xarxes per a tothom  

- UBICS: http://ubics.ub.edu/

UBICS (Universitat de Barcelona Institute of Complex Systems) celebrates its annual meeting.

Register here for participating in the event

Abstracts of the talks can be downloaded here

http://ubics.ub.edu

El 17 de maig del 2019, de 9.00 a 14.00 h, tindrà lloc a l’Edifici Històric de la Universitat de Barcelona la jornada de divulgació científica més festiva de la UB on l'UBICS hi participarà.

Al llarg del matí, la seu central de la Universitat s’omplirà de tota mena d’activitats pràctiques i de caràcter científic, com ara demostracions d’investigadors, tallers, jocs...L’objectiu de la festa és fer accessible a tots els públics, d’una manera lúdica i innovadora, la recerca que es duu a terme a la Universitat de Barcelona, i alhora reivindicar el paper rellevant de la ciència en tots els àmbits de la vida. Les activitats i els tallers programats pretenen fomentar la descoberta de la ciència que ens envolta i estimular la capacitat dels participants d’adoptar una actitud reflexiva i científica davant de qualsevol situació.

+ info: http://www.ub.edu/laubdivulga/festacienciaub/

http://www.ub.edu/laubdivulga/festacienciaub/