Bulletin of the American Physical Society
APS March Meeting 2010
Volume 55, Number 2
Monday–Friday, March 15–19, 2010; Portland, Oregon
Session B8: Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse Redux: The Physics of Global Catastrophes and Global Countermeasures |
Hide Abstracts |
Sponsoring Units: FIP Chair: John W. Clark, Washington University in St. Louis Room: Portland Ballroom 255 |
Monday, March 15, 2010 11:15AM - 11:51AM |
B8.00001: Failure and robustness in networks Invited Speaker: We consider the physics of structural failure in complex systems and the ways in which we can guard against it, from the point of view of network theory. How, for instance, can we design a communication network to provide robust connections when nodes are expected to fail regularly? Conversely, given a network such as the social network of contacts over which a disease spreads, how can we attack it so as to make it fail and thereby prevent the spread of disease? We consider a variety of different definitions of failure and robustness, and discuss some of the interesting and sometimes paradoxical behaviors that can arise when networks fail. [Preview Abstract] |
Monday, March 15, 2010 11:51AM - 12:27PM |
B8.00002: Forecasting techno-social systems: how physics and computing help to fight off global pandemics Invited Speaker: The crucial issue when planning for adequate public health interventions to mitigate the spread and impact of epidemics is risk evaluation and forecast. This amount to the anticipation of where, when and how strong the epidemic will strike. In the last decade advances in performance in computer technology, data acquisition, statistical physics and complex networks theory allow the generation of sophisticated simulations on supercomputer infrastructures to anticipate the spreading pattern of a pandemic. For the first time we are in the position of generating real time forecast of epidemic spreading. I will review the history of the current H1N1 pandemic, the major road-blocks the community has faced in its containment and mitigation and how physics and computing provide predictive tools that help us to battle epidemics. [Preview Abstract] |
Monday, March 15, 2010 12:27PM - 1:03PM |
B8.00003: Network Science for Deterrence: Sheathing the Sword of the Terrorism/Nuclear Horseman Invited Speaker: After 9/11, network analysis became popular as a way to connect and disconnect the dots. It was heralded as the new science with intrinsic value for understanding and breaking up terrorist groups, insurgencies and hostile foreign governments. The limit of the initially forwarded approach was that it focused on only the social network -- who talked to whom. However ,the networks of war, terror or nuclear or cyber, are complex networks composed of people, organizations, resources, and capabilities connected in a geo-temporal web that constrains and enables activities that are ``hidden'' in the web of everyday life. Identifying these networks requires extraction and fusion of information from cyber-mediated realms resulting in a network map of the hostile groups and their relations to the populations in which they are embedded. These data are at best a sample, albeit a very large sample, replete with missing and incomplete data. Geo-temporal considerations in addition to information loss and error called into question the value of traditional network approaches. In this talk, a new approaches and associated technologies that integrate scientific advances in machine learning, network statistics, and the social and organizational science with traditional graph theoretic approaches to social networks are presented. Then, examples, of how these technologies can be used as part of a deterrence strategy are described. Examples related to terrorism and groups such as al-Qaida and Hamas, cyber and nuclear deterrence are described. By taking this meta-network approach, embracing the complexity and simultaneously examining not just one network, but the connections among networks, it is possible to identify emergent leaders, locate changes in activities, and forecast the potential impact of various interventions. Key challenges, such as data-streaming and deception, that need to be addressed scientifically are referenced. [Preview Abstract] |
Monday, March 15, 2010 1:03PM - 1:39PM |
B8.00004: Global Response to Global Warming: Geoengineering with Stratospheric Aerosols Invited Speaker: Despite efforts to stabilize the atmospheric CO$_2$ concentration, it is possible that the climate system could respond abruptly with unanticipated catastrophic consequences. Intentional intervention (``geoengineering'') has been proposed to avoid or ameliorate such consequences has been proposed. One contemplated intervention would be the injection of artificial aerosols into the stratosphere to reduce the amount of shortwave (visible and near-IR) Solar radiation reaching the surface of the Earth. Natural volcanic injections of sulfate aerosols are known to produce short-lived (about a year) cooling, providing a ``proof of principle''. Artificial production and injection of aerosols involves a number of poorly understood physical and chemical processes, as well as a choice of aerosol material and injection method. I will outline some of these technical issues and unanswered questions. [Preview Abstract] |
Monday, March 15, 2010 1:39PM - 2:15PM |
B8.00005: Economic Fluctuations and Statistical Physics: Quantifying Extremely Rare Events with Applications to the Present Worldwide Crisis Invited Speaker: Recent analysis of truly huge quantities of empirical data suggests that classic economic theories not only fail for a few outliers, but that there occur similar outliers of every possible size. In fact, if one analyzes only a small data set (say data points), then outliers appear to occur as ``rare events.'' However, when we analyze orders of magnitude more data (200 million data points!), we find orders of magnitude more outliers---so ignoring them is not a responsible option, and studying their properties becomes a realistic goal. We find that the statistical properties of these ``outliers'' are identical to the statistical properties of everyday fluctuations. We report a recent discovery that the same laws govern the formation and bursting of large bubbles as tiny bubbles, over a factor of 1,000,000,000 in time scale. This work was carried out in collaboration with a number of colleagues, chief among whom are T. Preis, J. J. Schneider, X. Gabaix, V. Plerou, and P. Gopikrishnan. [Preview Abstract] |
Follow Us |
Engage
Become an APS Member |
My APS
Renew Membership |
Information for |
About APSThe American Physical Society (APS) is a non-profit membership organization working to advance the knowledge of physics. |
© 2024 American Physical Society
| All rights reserved | Terms of Use
| Contact Us
Headquarters
1 Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740-3844
(301) 209-3200
Editorial Office
100 Motor Pkwy, Suite 110, Hauppauge, NY 11788
(631) 591-4000
Office of Public Affairs
529 14th St NW, Suite 1050, Washington, D.C. 20045-2001
(202) 662-8700