Complex Webs: Anticipating the Improbable

Bruce J. West · Paolo Grigolini

Dec 2010 · Cambridge University Press

About this ebook

Complex Webs synthesises modern mathematical developments with a broad range of complex network applications of interest to the engineer and system scientist, presenting the common principles, algorithms, and tools governing network behaviour, dynamics, and complexity. The authors investigate multiple mathematical approaches to inverse power laws and expose the myth of normal statistics to describe natural and man-made networks. Richly illustrated throughout with real-world examples including cell phone use, accessing the Internet, failure of power grids, measures of health and disease, distribution of wealth, and many other familiar phenomena from physiology, bioengineering, biophysics, and informational and social networks, this book makes thought-provoking reading. With explanations of phenomena, diagrams, end-of-chapter problems, and worked examples, it is ideal for advanced undergraduate and graduate students in engineering and the life, social, and physical sciences. It is also a perfect introduction for researchers who are interested in this exciting new way of viewing dynamic networks.

About the author

Bruce J. West is Chief Mathematical Scientist with the Information Science Directorate at the Army Research Office, a position he has held for the last 10 years. After receiving his Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Rochester in 1970, he was Associate Director of a small private research institute (La Jolla Institute) for almost twenty years and a Professor at the University of North Texas for a decade. His research interests are in the nonlinear dynamics of complex networks. He has over 350 scientific publications, including 11 books and 8500 citations, and he has received multiple academic and government awards for his research and publications.

Paolo Grigolini is currently a Professor in the Physics Department and the Center for Nonlinear Science at the University of North Texas. He is an internationally recognized theorist interested in the foundations of quantum mechanics, including wave function collapse and the influence of classical chaos on quantum systems. His other research interests include the foundations of statistical physics, biophysical problems such as DNA sequencing and the network science of human decision making and cognition.