Past Events
May 2026 | |
| Fri 29 May 2026 12:30 - 13:30 | Seminar: Leonardo Brogi (U Siena): Trade Elasticities under Geopolitical Conflict and
Cooperation Centre for Complex Systems This paper provides a comprehensive macroeconomic assessment of how geopolitical friction and diplomatic cooperation shape international trade patterns. Utilizing high-frequency event data from the Integrated Crisis Early Warning System (ICEWS)... |
| Thu 21 May 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Evans Harrell: Extremal spectral problems for quantum graphs Centre for Complex Systems "Spectral optimization" refers to the study of how shapes affect eigenvalues of self-adjoint operators by trying to maximize or minimize an eigenvalue, or some combination of eigenvalues, under reasonable constraints. This is a well-developed... |
| Wed 20 May 2026 |  Conference: One-Day Ergodic Theory MeetingCentre for Complex Systems 1pm: Mélodie Andrieu (Université Littoral): A Normality conjecture on rational base number systems 2pm: José Alves (Universidade do Porto): Linear response for skew-product maps 3.30pm: Selim Ghazouani (University College London): Speculations about parabolic dynamical systems 4.30pm: Zhiyuan Zhang (Imperial College London): Ergodicity of conservative random dynamics Abstracts: Mélodie Andrieu: A Normality conjecture on rational base number systems The rational base... |
| Thu 14 May 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Alejandro Lage-Castellanos (U Havana): From Informal Trades to Limit Order Books: A Mean-Field View of the Cuban Peso Market Centre for Complex Systems Understanding price formation in markets with no central exchange—such as the informal currency market for the Cuban peso—has traditionally been challenging due to the lack of order books, tick rules, or centralized liquidity. In the first part... |
April 2026 | |
| Mon 20 - Wed 22 Apr 2026 | Conference: Statistical Physics Methods for Sustainable Energy Systems Centre for Complex Systems Focus topics: microgrids, digital twins, solar panels, data analytics, load shedding, stochastic modelling, wind power forecasting, machine learning techniques, interdisciplinary applications, storage and battery solutions, complex network approaches... |
| Thu 16 Apr 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: CANCELLED: Sabine Klapp (TU Berlin): Nonreciprocal active and decision-making systems: Connections between particle and continuum scale Centre for Complex Systems This event has been cancelled. Nonreciprocal systems have recently received much interest in the statistical physics community and beyond. One intriguing feature of such systems is their unusual collective behavior including, e.g., spontaneous... |
| Thu 9 Apr 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Anzhi Sheng (KTH Stockholm): Evolutionary game dynamics on complex networks Centre for Complex Systems Evolutionary game theory provides a powerful framework to study strategic interactions in biological, social, and technological systems. When spatial structure is introduced, the interplay between local interactions and global dynamics can lead to... |
March 2026 | |
| Tue 31 Mar 2026 11:30 - 12:30 | Seminar: Maximilian Engel (Amsterdam/Berlin): Transitions between order and chaos in stochastic environments Centre for Complex Systems The talk will present some steps towards a mathematical framework for studying transient (finite-time) phenomena in random dynamical systems. It is a natural property of such systems to exhibit several co-existing, metastable regimes in state... |
| Thu 26 Mar 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Constantino Tsallis (Rio de Janeiro): Complexity: what is it, and how does it relate to possibly nonadditive entropic functionals? Centre for Complex Systems Boltzmann-Gibbs statistical mechanics is, together with Newton, Einstein and quantum mechanics, and Maxwell electromagnetism, one of the pillars of contemporary theoretical physics. This theory satisfactorily handles uncountably many physical systems... |
| Thu 19 Mar 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Karl J. Friston (UCL): The physics of sentience Centre for Complex Systems How can we understand ourselves as sentient creatures? And what are the principles that underwrite sentient behaviour? This presentation uses the free energy principle to furnish an account in terms of active inference. First, we will try to... |
| Wed 4 Mar 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Sanjay Kumar (Banaras Hindu U): Stochastic Dynamics of Polymer Translocation Centre for Complex Systems Polymer translocation through narrow pores is a fundamental process with broad relevance, ranging from biological phenomena such as DNA transport through nuclear pores to the development of nanopore-based sequencing technologies. In this work, we... |
February 2026 | |
| Thu 26 Feb 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Edon Kelmendi (QMUL): Decision Problems for Linear Dynamical Systems Centre for Complex Systems This talk is about algorithms for iterations of linear maps. Given a linear map in the form of a matrix M with rational entries, and some point x, what can we say algorithmically about the sequence Mx, M^2 x, M^3 x, … . In particular, is there an... |
| Thu 19 Feb 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Luke Davis (U Edinburgh): Stochastic geometry of active matter Centre for Complex Systems For equilibrium hard spheres the stochastic geometry of the insertion space, the room to accommodate another sphere, relates exactly to the equation of state. We begin to extend this idea to active matter, analyzing insertion space for repulsive... |
| Mon 16 Feb 2026 12:00 - 13:00 | Seminar: Raphaël Henry (Aix-Marseille University): Smooth words and their factor complexity Centre for Complex Systems Smooth words over an alphabet of integers {a,b} are infinite words that are infinitely derivable, the most famous example being the Oldenburger-Kolakoski word over {1,2}. We study here the factor complexity of these words: we first show bounds for... |
| Thu 12 Feb 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: David Mguni (QMUL): Language, Learning, and Limits: Representations at the Frontier of General-Purpose AI Centre for Complex Systems Recent advances in large language models have encouraged the view that natural language, mediated through prompting, could act as a universal interface for general-purpose learning. In this talk, I challenge that assumption by analysing the... |
| Thu 5 Feb 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Martina Contisciani (CEU Vienna): Multiscale network modeling of migration flows in Austria Centre for Complex Systems Migration plays a crucial role in urbanization, segregation, gentrification, and numerous phenomena related to socioeconomic development. Understanding the diverse drivers of mobility not only provides a deeper comprehension of the underlying social... |
January 2026 | |
| Thu 29 Jan 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Markus Whiteland (Loughborough): Automaticity aspects of combinatorial complexity functions of infinite words Centre for Complex Systems Infinite words can be used to encode interesting properties of the orbits of discrete dynamical systems. Analysing the complexity of such a system may then be analysed through this encoding. Combinatorially speaking, quite often its complexity is... |
| Thu 22 Jan 2026 13:00 - 14:00 | Seminar: Eng-Jon Ong (QMUL) Centre for Complex Systems |