Federico Battiston

Rank: 
Associate Professor

Contact information

Building: 
Vienna, Quellenstrasse 51
Room: 
D308

Hi!

My name is Federico, and I am an Associate Professor in Network Science. Before joining CEU (where I was a Research Fellow and an Assistant Professor before my current position) I was a PostDoc at University College London and the Brain & Spine Institute in Paris. I hold a PhD from Queen Mary University of London (under the supervision of Vito Latora). Before that, I received BSc and MSc degrees in statistical physics from Sapienza University of Rome.

I am Chair of NetSci2023, the flagship conference of the Network Science Society whose next European edition will be held in Vienna (we expect more than 1000 participants!). I am a former Elected Chair of the Young Researchers of the Complex Systems Society, and a current Elected Member of its council. My research has appeared in several international journals, including Nature Physics (twice!), Science Advances, Nature CommunicationsNature Human Behavior, Nature Reviews Physics, Physics Reports and many others. I am the editor of the book 'Higher-order systems' for the Springer series Understanding Complex Systems. I am part of the Program Committees of NetSci, CCS, IC2S2 and CompleNet, an elected member of the Council of the Complex Systems Society and a former elected Chair of the young researchers of the Complex Systems Society. I am the Network Associate Editor for (Nature) Communications Physics, the little sister of Nature Communications, for which I curate publications in the field of network science and complex systems. In 2021 I have also guest-edited the first ever Focus Collection for this journal, on the topic of 'Higher-order interaction networks'.

In 2022 I received the Junior Award of the Complex Systems Society:

https://cssociety.org/news/122

In 2021 I received the Early Career Prize in Statistical and NonLinear Physics of the European Physical Society:

https://www.eps.org/members/group.aspx?id=85204

In 2021 I have also received the CEU Award for Outstanding Research:

https://www.ceu.edu/2021-excellence

I use my background in statistical physics and complexity science to describe social networks, model sustainable urban systems and understand the human brain. I am an expert of generalised network structures (networks, but 'beyond simple networks'!), including multilayer networks and higher-order networks. I also work a lot on understanding how network structure affects and determines dynamics and the emergence of often unexpected collective behavior. My favorite dynamical processes are concerned with the modeling of human behavior, including epidemic spreading, social and cultural dynamics, innovation dynamics, evolutionary game theory and cooperation, but I have also worked a lot on random walk and diffusion, reaction-diffusion and pattern formation, synchronization (this one also describes the brain, e.g. epilepsy!). I also work with datasets on ecological networks, large-scale publication data, online and offline social interactions and escape rooms...

I was the main advisor of Milan Janosov (PhD completed in 2020), Luis Natera (PhD completed in 2021) and Rebeka Szabo (PhD completed in 2022). Currently I am the main advisor of 3 more PhD students at CEU (Sandeep Chowdhary, Leonardo Di Gaetano and Onkar Sadekar), and the co-PhD advisor of Francesco Lotito from University of Trento. Two of the PhD students working under my supervision have received the CEU Advanced Award for Doctoral Students.

My current website is experiencing a major refurbishment to come back stronger and brighter (!), but luckily my Google Scholar's profile can still be useful to track my most recent research.

Qualification

PhD in Applied Mathematics, Queen Mary University of London
MSc in Theoretical Physics, Sapienza University of Rome
BSc in Physics, Sapienza University of Rome