ASU's Innovative Program will integrate research in science, engineering, social sciences & computer

Arizona State University

ASU has launched a major new initiative that will revolutionize academic research through the innovative convergence of science, engineering, social sciences and computing.


...The Complex Adaptive Systems Initiative, or CASI, is focusing ASU's growing interdisciplinary strengths on large-scale problems where an integrated effort is essential and likely to require creation of entirely new technologies and scientific directions.

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"This initiative will help us better understand how complex systems function and help us to develop practical solutions addressing multiple aspects of a problem, while doing a better job of avoiding unintended consequences," Crow says.

An advisory group of experts will to be engaged to provide strategic input.

Fields such as biology, medicine, chemistry, engineering and physics often are described as natural sciences, while social sciences and the humanities include, among others, anthropology, law, economics, history, sociology and psychology. Formal sciences, such as mathematics, logics and computer technologies, are often grouped within both of the other categories.

Yet, each of these fields has something to contribute to understanding and solving complex problems, Poste and van der Leeuw say.

Van der Leeuw's role in the initiative will include oversight of a new Consortium for Biosocial Complex Systems. This new group will bring together three existing research units in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences: the Center for the Study of Institutional Diversity; the Center for Social Dynamics and Complexity; and the Mathematical, Computational and Modeling Sciences Center.

"Integration is the key to being a leader in solving complex challenges," van der Leeuw says. "You must be able to look at problems holistically, and not just at one point in time, but across time. The consortium's goal is to position ASU as leader in research, education and application of complex system concepts and methods across living and social systems. By bringing it within the larger construct of the Complex Adaptive Systems Initiative, we can bring the expertise of the consortium to bear on the problems Dr. Poste and I will be attempting to address."

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http://clas.asu.edu/news_article?node=8251