A Concise Introduction To The Statistical Physics Of Complex Systems
Download A Concise Introduction To The Statistical Physics Of Complex Systems PDF/ePub or read online books in Mobi eBooks. Click Download or Read Online button to get A Concise Introduction To The Statistical Physics Of Complex Systems book now. This website allows unlimited access to, at the time of writing, more than 1.5 million titles, including hundreds of thousands of titles in various foreign languages.
A Concise Introduction to the Statistical Physics of Complex Systems
Author: Eric Bertin
language: en
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Release Date: 2011-09-28
This concise primer (based on lectures given at summer schools on complex systems and on a masters degree course in complex systems modeling) will provide graduate students and newcomers to the field with the basic knowledge of the concepts and methods of statistical physics and its potential for application to interdisciplinary topics. Indeed, in recent years, statistical physics has begun to attract the interest of a broad community of researchers in the field of complex system sciences, ranging from biology to the social sciences, economics and computer science. More generally, a growing number of graduate students and researchers feel the need to learn some basic concepts and questions originating in other disciplines without necessarily having to master all of the corresponding technicalities and jargon. Generally speaking, the goals of statistical physics may be summarized as follows: on the one hand to study systems composed of a large number of interacting ‘entities’, and on the other to predict the macroscopic (or collective) behavior of the system considered from the microscopic laws ruling the dynamics of the individual ‘entities’. These two goals are, to some extent, also shared by what is nowadays called ‘complex systems science’ and for these reasons, systems studied in the framework of statistical physics may be considered as among the simplest examples of complex systems—allowing in addition a rather well developed mathematical treatment.
Statistical Physics of Complex Systems
This course-tested primer provides graduate students and non-specialists with a basic understanding of the concepts and methods of statistical physics and demonstrates their wide range of applications to interdisciplinary topics in the field of complex system sciences, including selected aspects of theoretical modeling in biology and the social sciences. Generally speaking, the goals of statistical physics may be summarized as follows: on the one hand to study systems composed of a large number of interacting units, and on the other to predict the macroscopic, collective behavior of the system considered from the perspective of the microscopic laws governing the dynamics of the individual entities. These two goals are essentially also shared by what is now called 'complex systems science,' and as such, systems studied in the framework of statistical physics may be considered to be among the simplest examples of complex systems – while also offering a rather well developed mathematical treatment. The second edition has been significantly revised and expanded, featuring in particular three new chapters addressing non-conserved particles, evolutionary population dynamics, networks, properties of both individual and coupled simple dynamical systems, and convergence theorems, as well as short appendices that offer helpful hints on how to perform simple stochastic simulations in practice. Yet, the original spirit of the book – to remain accessible to a broad, non-specialized readership – has been kept throughout: the format is a set of concise, modular and self-contained topical chapters, avoiding technicalities and jargon as much as possible, and complemented by a wealth of worked-out examples, so as to make this work useful as a self-study text or as textbook for short courses. From the reviews of the first edition: “... a good introduction to basic concepts of statistical physics and complex systems for students and researchers with an interest in complex systems in other fields ... .” Georg Hebermehl, Zentralblatt MATH, Vol. 1237, 2012 “... this short text remains very refreshing for the mathematician.” Dimitri Petritis, Mathematical Reviews, Issue 2012k
Complexity in Economic and Social Systems
There is no term that better describes the essential features of human society than complexity. On various levels, from the decision-making processes of individuals, through to the interactions between individuals leading to the spontaneous formation of groups and social hierarchies, up to the collective, herding processes that reshape whole societies, all these features share the property of irreducibility, i.e., they require a holistic, multi-level approach formed by researchers from different disciplines. This Special Issue aims to collect research studies that, by exploiting the latest advances in physics, economics, complex networks, and data science, make a step towards understanding these economic and social systems. The majority of submissions are devoted to financial market analysis and modeling, including the stock and cryptocurrency markets in the COVID-19 pandemic, systemic risk quantification and control, wealth condensation, the innovation-related performance of companies, and more. Looking more at societies, there are papers that deal with regional development, land speculation, and the-fake news-fighting strategies, the issues which are of central interest in contemporary society. On top of this, one of the contributions proposes a new, improved complexity measure.