Network Science for the Society of the Future
- planetnlorg
- 4 days ago
- 2 min read
On behalf of the Platform for Large Scale Analysis of Networks (PLANET-NL), we are pleased to invite you to join us virtually for the Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) Festival Future Challenges session, Network Science for the Society of the Future, from 14:00-16:00 on the 20th of May, 2026.
The mission of the Institute for Advanced Study at the University of Amsterdam is to advance cutting-edge interdisciplinary research that addresses complex scientific and societal challenges. The IAS is a community and an incubator where we focus on such complex problems, with researchers from inside and outside the University of Amsterdam, including PLANET-NL.
The UvA Institute for Advanced Study (IAS) Festival celebrates the institute's 10-year anniversary. From May 18-21, IAS opens our doors to the public, and reflects on a decade of collaborative interdisciplinary research, while looking ahead to the questions of tomorrow. As part of the week-long celebration, PLANET-NL has organized a Future Challenges session focused on “Imagining 2036: how can network science shape a better society - and what will this demand from scholars, policymakers, and research infrastructure?”
During this session, PLANET-NL aims to take a step back and reflect on how doing network science, with a focus on social applications, has changed over the last decade and envision how it will change over the ten years ahead. The session begins with a keynote presentation from Rafael Prieto-Curiel (Complexity Science Hub), who will give a bird's-eye view on the changes in the field of social network science and whose recent work using computational methods to analyse crime networks and migration has broad-reaching findings for societal challenges. Two discussants will then provide reflections from complementary perspectives: one focusing on policy applications and the other on research infrastructure, featuring Laure Michon (O&S) and Tom Emery, (ODDISEI). In the concluding part of the session, all participants are invited to join a round-table discussion to respond to the challenges raised by the speakers or to bring their own puzzle to the table.
Please register here before May 19 to receive a calendar invitation with the zoom link for the event. You are also invited to register for the other in-person Future Challenges sessions and fringe events as part of the IAS Festival, but act fast, as space is extremely limited.
Looking forward to welcoming you to the event!
