Melanie Mitchell: Complexity: An Introduction

Melanie Mitchell is Professor of Computer Science at Portland State University, and External Professor and Member of the Science Board at the Santa Fe Institute. She has held faculty or professional positions at the University of Michigan, the Santa Fe Institute, Los Alamos National Laboratory, the OGI School of Science and Engineering, and Portland State University. She is the author or editor of five books and over 70 scholarly papers in the fields of artificial intelligence, cognitive science, and complex systems. Her most recent book, Complexity: A Guided Tour (Oxford, 2009), won the 2010 Phi Beta Kappa Science Book Award. It was also named by Amazon.com as one of the ten best science books of 2009, and was longlisted for the Royal Society’s 2010 book prize. Melanie directs the Santa Fe Institute’s Complexity Explorer project, which offers online courses and other educational resources related to the field of complex systems.

David O’Sullivan: Spatial Simulation

David O’Sullivan is an Associate Professor in the Department of Geography at the University of California, Berkeley.  His research explores the relationships between spatial structures and processes using the simulation models of complexity science.  He examines fundamental concepts in spatial analysis and modeling, as well as the implications of how we represent the world using geospatial technologies, computation, and the complexity sciences, and then use these representations to do geography.   These ideas are central to his new book Spatial Simulation: Exploring Pattern and Process.

Cassandra Moseley: Complexity and Social Resilience

Cass is the Director of both the Institute for a Sustainable Environment (ISE) and the Ecosystem Workforce Program at the University of Oregon, and is on the Graduate Faculty of the Department of Political Science. Her research focuses on natural resource politics and policy, public land management, community-based conservation, natural resources business and labor, community forestry, rural development, political institutions like the U.S. Forest Service, and American political development.  Her research is located primarily in the Pacific Northwest and the American West.

Chris Bone: Ecological Complexity

Chris is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography at the University of Oregon and co-Director of the S3C Lab (Spatial Computation, Cognition and Complexity). His research focuses on the coupled dynamics of human and natural systems, specifically in the context of forest dynamics.  He uses several different methods of modeling and analysis, including agent-based modeling, cellular automata, machine learning and various spatial statistics, and GIS-related methods.  His current projects investigate the anthropogenic and biological drivers behind native and invasive forest pathogens and insects.  Other projects include assisting in the development of geospatial technologies and models for assisting sustainable transportation.

Amy Lobben: Agents and Cognition

Amy is the head of the Department of Geography at the University of Oregon and co-Director of the S3C Lab.  Amy’s research focuses on spatial cognition and thinking as well as the interaction between humans and the built environment, and more specifically on issues of mobility and individual differences.  She incorporates a variety of conceptual and methodological approaches in her research including conceptual and analytical modeling, geospatial technologies, psychological measurement, and neuroimaging.

Bart Johnson: Surprise in Coupled Human-Natural Systems

Bart is an Associate Professor in the Department of Landscape Architecture at the University of Oregon.  His research focuses on the integration of ecology with landscape design, planning, and management.  Specifically, participatory landscape planning, fire ecology, savanna and prairie restoration, and urban ecology.  He applies conceptual frameworks and analytical techniques from ecology toward design and planning, as well as using the cultural knowledge and approaches of landscape architecture to deepen knowledge of how humans structure ecosystems.  His current projects focus on conservation planning and restoration ecology for open habitats, which includes site-scale design and restoration and landscape planning across gradients from wildlands to urban centers.

Tom Spies: Exploring Complexity in Human-Environment Interactions

Tom is a Professor at Oregon State University in the Department of Forest Ecosystems & Society as well as  a Research Forester with the US Forest Service.  His research interests include forest ecology, forest succession, stand and landscape structure dynamics, old growth forest ecology and conservation, overstory-understory relationships, and coupled natural and human systems.  Currently his research is focused on landscape dynamics in mixed-severity fire regimes, forest policy effects, and old-growth forest conservation in fire prone landscapes.

Wayne Wakeland: Will Data-driven Models Drive Causal Models to Extinction

Wayne is an Associate Professor at Portland State University in the School of the Environment, Systems Science Program.  His research interests include ecological economics and sustainability, health systems policy, biomedical dynamics, software development process, criminal justice systems, supply chain management, organizational dynamics and systems thinking, and simulation & optimization methods.  He uses the following simulation languages: Vensim, NetLogo, Arena, Extend, ProModel, and STELLA.  He also has a background as a manager in information systems or manufacturing at various high tech firms.