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Category: Complex Systems

Complex systems are ubiquitous in today’s world and they experience serious issues caused by emergent behavior, self-organization, and cooperation among their entities. Emergence becomes a distinguishing system feature as system complexity grows with the number of components, interactions and connectivity. Example of emergent behaviors include the flocking of birds, traffic jams, ant colonies, biological life, hubs in social networks, competition in energy power markets, smart grids, and smart cities among others. Despite significant research interest in recent years, there is a lack of formal methods to understand, identify, and predict the behavior of complex systems, especially as systems grow in size, inter-connection between components, the number of component attributes and their geographical distribution.

This project looks at practical approaches for the computer-aided analysis of current complex systems, with a focus on obtaining insight into their behavior.

Project leader: Dr Claudia Szabo.

WSC 2018

Our paper, A Simulation Testbed for the Analysis of Desired Emergent Properties in System Running in Dynamic and Contested Environments, has been accepted for publication in the Winter Simulation Conference 2018. Authors: C. Szabo, D. Craggs, W. Johnson, G. Judd, K. French Abstract: Designing complex systems with a specific emergent property is challenging even in […]

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ALife 2018

Our paper, Multi-objective Strategies for Exploring Form and Function in Crustaceans, has been accepted for publication in ALife 2018. Authors: C. Szabo, J. Barnes, P. Munguia Abstract: In biology, there is a direct and dynamic relationship between an individual’s \textit{form}, in terms of shape, size, number and connection of limbs, and the functions that the […]

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New Masters student joins group

Thomas McAtee will be joining our group to study how to best design communication strategies in contested and resource constrained environments using evolutionary approaches. Welcome Tom!

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New Honours student joins group!

Ben Morris will work on his honours project in 2018, entitled: Analysis Cities from a Bacterial Growth Perspective Project description: Rapid growth of urban centres over the decades has led to shortage of resources, high-density habitation, and massive transit expansion amongst others. Several studies of urban growth have found similarity between human urban expansion and […]

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New PhD Student

Alexis Pfaulm joins the group as a PhD student. Welcome, Alexis!

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SASO 2017: Identifying Self-Organization And Adaptability In Complex Adaptive Systems

Our paper, Identifying Self-Organization And Adaptability In Complex Adaptive Systems has been accepted for publication at SASO 2017. Authors: L. Birdsey, C. Szabo, K. Falkner Abstract: Self-organization and adaptability are critical properties of complex adaptive systems (CAS), and their analysis provides insight into the design of these systems, consequently leading to real-world advancements. However, these properties […]

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PhD Thesis: Adaptive Anomalous Behavior Identification in Large-Scale Distributed Systems

Dr Javier Alvarez receives his PhD with a thesis entitled Adaptive Anomalous Behavior Identification in Large-Scale Distributed Systems. Dr Alvarez’ thesis also receives a Dean’s Commendation for Research Excellence. Thesis abstract: Distributed systems have become pervasive. From laptops and mobile phones, to servers and data centers, most computers communicate and coordinate their activities through some kind of […]

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WSC 2017: Simulating the Effect of Degraded Wireless Communications on Emergent Behavior

Our paper, Simulating the Effect of Degraded Wireless Communications on Emergent Behavior, has been accepted for publication in the Winter Simulation Conference 2017. Authors: B. Fraser, R. Hunjet, C. Szabo Abstract: Most swarming algorithms require individual nodes to know the locations of their nearest-neighbor peers. Existing work assumes that this information is abundant and readily available, however, […]

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Research Contract: Resilient and Contextually Integrated ISR Information Dissemination, 2017-2018

C.Szabo, DST Group, $91,698 The aim of this project is to design and implement a prototype for the effective integration of ISR information at the tactical edge. Specifically, this project will research and develop a prototype that demonstrates the viability of employing a computational, distributed intelligence that will adapt information dissemination priorities according to the […]

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AAMAS 2017: Large-Scale Complex Adaptive Systems Analysis using Multi-Agent Modeling and Simulation

Our paper has been accepted for AAMAS 2017! Title: Large-Scale Complex Adaptive Systems Analysis using Multi-Agent Modeling and Simulation Authors: L. Birdsey, C. Szabo, K. Falkner Abstract: Modeling and analysis of large-scale complex adaptive systems (CAS) is critical to understanding their key properties such as self-organization, emergence, and adaptability. These properties are difficult to analyze in real-world […]

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