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Writer's pictureAJ SK

Network science to tackle global issues

There are certain tweets that affect financial markets. We speculate it in a way to give reflexes on different situations and fake news. Everything moves through a network. These tiny networks are part of one big network. The network doesn’t move in a vacuum but through information or energy. These multiplier or multiplex networks; network science with steroids. The fake news that travels on social media is the complex set of networks.

Alessandro Vespignani, Sternbergy Family Distinguished University Professor of Physics, Computer Sciences, and Health Sciences at Northeastern University says, ”We need to look at the Facebook network coupled with the need network, with Twitter, and even the actual physical encounters in meetings, in workplaces.”

As the world is always connected, it increases the interactions happening in it. It’s time to tackle many critical issues by studying and analysing these networks.

The new initiative taken up by the network science institutions of Northeastern and Indiana University is called AccelNet-MultiNet. This project involves researchers in the European Universities to specialise in multilayer networks and build a global community of network scientists.

This initiative will provide scientists all over the world with the tools and data to make better models and predictions of the processes such as sharing ideas, mapping the brain, reducing traffic jams, and also tackle epidemics like Ebola.

The global issues are rooted in the basics of networks and complex systems for network scientists. The networks that can be formulated in equations, in turn, can be extrapolated to analyse these global issues. This formula essentially mathematically folded into various other things like cars, computers, people, and cells but the basic formula will be universal. So, the power of network science is a conceptual simplicity.

However, this network science is a robust mechanism as it can only work on specific fields and operates on narrow technical methods.

The new initiative can overcome this issue by creating international consensus around the future challenges and priorities. This new project will give a taste of its own by creating a network to tackle a network.

Shweta Tripathi

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