Dynamical Systems Interdisciplinary Network
CLOSED PROJECT
Dynamical Systems Interdisciplinary Network (DSIN) was about Mathematical Modeling and Statistical Methodology for the Social, Health and Natural Sciences. The project network encompassed visual cognition, neuronal signalling and networks, renal and cardiovascular physiology, metabolomics, molecular dynamics and econometrics.
By combining ideas from the many fields where an understanding of dynamical systems are essential, and by combining comprehensiveness with in-depth expertise, we created an internationally unique research centre, where pioneering methodology could be developed thanks to cross-disciplinary collaboration.
A long standing challenge in complex systems is how to understand the interaction between large numbers of constituents, for the purpose of understanding their macroscopic nature. The overall aim of the Dynamical Systems Interdisciplinary Network is to develop mathematical models and statistical methods suited for the analysis of empirical data obtained from such systems.
The aim is to better understand the dynamics, regulatory properties as well as how the dynamics are affected by random perturbations.
The statistical methodology will enable analysis of high-dimensional systems, and in particular, discover simple structures in complex data. Such insight is essential for prediction of future behaviour and for understanding flux regulation, oscillations, bifurcations, synchronization, chaos, and uniquely for this proposal, metastable non-equilibrium states.
A major challenge is to extract information from huge data sets produced in modern quantitative sciences, on how measurable components work together as a dynamical system - to achieve an understanding beyond that obtained by studying isolated components. For this it is essential to combine a deep knowledge of the subject matter with statistical and mathematical insight.
The theoretical research will focus on issues of central importance to applications, which in turn will serve as a testing ground for new methodology. The project will facilitate the flow of ideas between research areas that share similar methodological challenges but where collaboration is uncommon.
Common challenges for scientists across disciplines
Different complex systems often have common attributes and therefore pose common challenges for scientists across disciplines. Some of the attributes are:
- strong degree of hierarchical organization,
- constituents of a sub-system on one scale has much more interaction within the sub-system than across subsystems,
- qualitative aspects of behaviors are repeated over time, but are quantitatively difficult to characterize,
- feedback mechanisms are pervasive, and
- stability is dominant in spite of flexibility and the large behavioral repertoire.
A field rich in examples of such complex systems is biology. For instance, a neuron contains a complex biochemical interaction as well as morphology. Spines, dendrites and shafts are all small constituents of a neuron. Each neuron is a constituent in a local network. Each local network is a constituent in a large-scale brain structure, and each brain area is a constituent of the brain. The vascular blood flow in the kidneys, metabolic pathways, protein dynamics, psychological processes and economic behaviors have similar features.
The link between the individual elements and the macroscopic function is by no means obvious, and describing and understanding parallel processes in general is the key in these systems.
The principal investigator:
Professor Susanne Ditlevsen [see interview]
Department of Mathematical Sciences, SCIENCE
E-mail: susanne@math.ku.dk
Phone: 3532 0785
The teams consist of:
Team: Physiology (Phys)
Niels-Henrik Holstein-Rathlou
Olga Sosnovtseva [see interview]
Jens Christian Brings Jacobsen
Bjørn Quistorff
Department of Biomedical Sciences, SUND
Team: Neuroscience (Neuro)
Jørn Hounsgaard
Per Roland
Rune Berg [see interview]
Jakob Kristoffer Kisbye Dreyer
Department of Neuroscience, SUND
Team: Biostatistics (BioStat)
Esben Budtz-Jørgensen
Torben Martinussen
Theis Lange [see interview]
Department of Publich Health, SUND (former LIFE)
Team: Psychology (Psyc)
Claus Bundesen
Søren Kyllingsbæk [see interview]
Department of Psychology, SAMF
Team: Econometrics (Econ)
Anders Rahbek [see interview]
Department of Economics, SAMF
Team: Mathematics and Statistics (MatStat)
Susanne Ditlevsen [see interview]
Michael Sørensen
Carsten Wiuf
Niels Richard Hansen
Peter Ditlevsen (from Niels Bohr Institute)
Department of Mathematical Sciences, SCIENCE
Team: Bioinformatics (Bioinf)
Thomas Hamelryck [see interview]
Bioinformatics Centre, Biologisk institut, SCIENCE
Faculties supporting the project: SCIENCE, SUND and SAMF
The people below were fully or partially financed by the network.
Abhishek Pal Majumder, postdoc
Reaction Network Group, Department of Mathematical Science
abhishek@math.ku.dk
Project: Long time asymptotics of Stochastic Reaction Network.
Starting date: September, 2015
Supervisor: Carsten Wiuf
Educational background: B-Stat, M-Stat from Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata (2004 -2009); Junior Research Fellow, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata (2009 -2010); Phd in Statistics, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, (2010 - 2015).
Research interests: Long time asymptotics, Stochastic process, Weakly interacting particle system, Concentration bounds, Statistical Inference, MCMC.
Adam Lund, PhD student
Department of Mathematical Sciences
adam.lund@math.ku.dk
Project: Spatio-temporal modeling of neuron fields.
Starting date: 01.07.2013.
Supervisors: Niels Richard Hansen, Department of Mathematical Sciences and Per Ebbe Roland, Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology.
Educational background: M.Sc., University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, 2012; M.Sc., Columbia University, New York, 2010; B.Sc., University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, 2008.
Research interests: High dimensional statistics, computational statistics, dynamic probabilistic modeling, stochastic differential equations, stochastic processes.
An Dau An Dau, postdoc
Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology
adau@sund.ku.dk
Project: My postdoctoral project is aimed at describing cortical dynamics in visual and auditory cortices. I use in vivo voltage sensitive dye imaging and extracellular recordings to describe the spatiotemporal responses to sensory inputs in different cortical regions and layers.
Starting date: 01.01.2014
Mentors: Per Roland and Tania Rinaldi Barkat (both are at Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology).
Educational background: Bachelor degree in Systems Engineering and PhD in Neuroscience (the University of Sheffield, United Kingdom).
Research interests: Mouse visual and auditory cortices, electrophysiology, optogenetics, VSD imaging, biological system modelling.
Andreas Kryger Jensen, postdoc
Section of Biostatistics, Dept. of Public Health aeje@sund.ku.dk
Project: The role of dopamine signaling in behavior and learning.
Starting date: 19.05.2014
Mentors: Torben Martinussen and Esben Budtz-Jørgensen, Section of Biostatistics, Dept. of Public Health. Collaborator: Jakob Kristoffer Kisbye Dreyer, Dept. of Neuroscience and Pharmacology.
Educational Background: BSc and MSc in Robot Technology, University of Southern Denmark, PhD in Biostatistics, University of Southern Denmark.
Research activities: Functional data, point processes, high-dimensional data.
Bjørn Olav Hald, postdoc
Department of Biomedical Sciences
bohald@sund.ku.dk
Project: Perfusion and flow distribution in the microcirculation.
Starting date: 1.12.2013.
Mentors: Niels-Henrik Holstein Rathlou (Dept. of Biomedical Sciences), Ed Van Bavel (University of Amsterdam), & Don Welsh (University of Calgary)
Educational background: BSc: Biochemistry, MSc: Chemistry (University of Copenhagen), PhD: Computational Physiology (University of Copenhagen)
Research interests: Dynamical Systems, Physiological systems, Synchronization, Yeast oscillations.
Catalina Vich, guest PhD student
Department of Mathematical Sciences
catilin75@hotmail.com
Starting date: 22.9.2015 - 29.1.2016
Supervisor: Susanne Ditlevsen, MATH. Antoni Guillamon, Barcelona
Educational background: PhD student from Universitat de les Illes Balears (UIB), Spain. BSc from Universitat de les Illes Balears and MSc from Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC).
Research interests: Computational Neuroscience and dynamical systems. Estimation of the synaptic conductance.
Ditte Nørbo Sørensen Ditte Nørbo Sørensen, PhD student
Section of Biostatistics, Dept. of Public Health
diso@sund.ku.dk
Project: Estimating causal effects using instrumental variables.
Starting date: 01.04.2014
Supervisors: Torben Martinussen, Section of Biostatistics, and Mette Ejrnæs, Department of Economics.
Educational background: M.Sc. in Statistics, University of Copenhagen.
Research interests: Survival analysis, stochastic processes and stochastic integrals.
Eduardo García Portugués, postdoc
Department of Mathematical Sciences & Bioinformatics Centre, Department of Biology
edugarpor@gmail.com
Project: Probabilistic protein structure prediction guided by diffusive models of folding pathways.
Starting date: 01.01.2015
Mentors: Thomas Hamelryck (Bioinformatics Centre, Department of Biology) and Michael Sørensen (Department of Mathematical Sciences)
Educational background: BSc in Mathematics with major in Statistics and Operations Research, MSc in Statistical Techniques and PhD in Statistics and Operations Research (University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain).
Research interests: Nonparametric statistics, Directional statistics, Functional data, Goodness-of-fit methods, Computational statistics, Copulas, Kernel Smoothing, Stochastic processes.
Erik Andreas Martens, assistant professor
Department of Biomedical Sciences & Department of Mathematical Sciences
erik.martens@sund.ku.dk
Project: Mathematical Modeling of Collective Behavior of Physiological Systems.
Starting date: 15.10.2013.
Collaborators: Niels-Henrik Holstein Rathlou (Dept. of Biomedical Sciences) & Susanne Ditlevsen (Dept. of Mathematics).
Educational background: Physics (M.Sc.ETH, Zürich, Switzerland), Theoretical Mechanics/Applied Mathematics (Ph.D. Cornell University, Ithaca, USA).
Research interests: Dynamical Systems, oscillator/synchronization theory, biophysics of physiological systems, network dynamics. Further details: http://eam.webhop.net
Henrik Anders Lindén, postdoc
Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology
hlinden@sund.ku.dk
Project: Attractor network dynamics in the spinal cord.
Starting date: 01.09.2013.
Mentor: Rune Berg, PI, Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology.
Educational background: M.Sc. in Engineering Physics 2006 (Complex Adaptive Systems), Chalmers University of Technology, Gothenburg, Sweden. Ph.D. in Physics 2010 (Computational Neuroscience), Norwegian University of Life Sciences, Ås, Norway.
Research interests: Dynamics of networks of spiking neurons. Relation between neuronal activity and mescoscopic brain signals. Analysis techniques for neuronal data.
Jacob Østergaard, PhD student
Department of Mathematical Sciences
ostergaard@math.ku.dk
Project: Cointegration and Phase Space Synchronization.
Starting date: 01.01.2015.
Mentors: Susanne Ditlevsen, MATH and Anders Rahbek, the Department of Economics.
Educational background: M.Sc. in Statistics, Aarhus University 2010. Previously worked as a quantitative analyst in Nordea.
Research interests: Cointegration, Nonlinear Dynamics and Statistical Programming.
Jesper Foldager, PhD student
Bioinformatics Centre, Department of Biology
foldager@binf.ku.dk
Project: Modeling of protein structure in atomic detail using Bayesian methods. Secondly, formulating a probabilistic model for the folding pathway of proteins to guide the conformational search during the prediction of protein structure.
Starting date: 1. August 2014
Mentors: Associate professor Thomas Hamelryck, Bioinformatics Centre, Department of Biology, and Professor Michael Sørensen, MATH.
Educational background: M.Sc. in Eng., Bioinformatics and Systems Biology, DTU.
Research interests: Probabilistic models, machine learning, and protein structure prediction.
Kang Li, PhD student
Department of Mathematical Sciences
k.li@math.ku.dk
Project: Statistical inference in the Neural Theory of Visual Attention.
Starting date: 01.11.2013
Supervisors: Susanne Ditlevsen, MATH, and Søren Kyllingsbæk, Department of Psychology.
Educational background: B.Sc in Biotechnology, Minor in Computer Science, M.Sc in Bioinformatics.
Research interests: Stochastic Processes, Bayesian inference, Neural spike models, Statistical models of protein structure determination and prediction.
Mareile Große Ruse, PhD student
Department of Mathematical Sciences
mgrosseruse@gmail.com
Project: Stochastic differential mixed-effect models.
Starting date: 01.01.2015
Mentor: Susanne Ditlevsen, MATH
Educational background: B.Sc in Mathematics from the Leibniz University of Hanover, Germany, M.Sc in Mathematics from the Humboldt University of Berlin, Germany.
Research interests: Stochastic differential equations, stochastic processes, Bayesian inference.
Robyn Stuart, Postdoc
Department of Mathematical Sciences
rstuart@kirby.unsw.edu.au
Project: Statistical Inference in Multivariate Dynamic Models | Hemodynamics Modeling.
Starting date: 01.01.2015.
Mentors: Susanne Ditlevsen, Department of Mathematical Sciences, and Olga Sosnovtseva, Department of Biomedical Sciences.
Educational background: PhD in Mathematics from the University of New South Wales, Sydney; MSc in Statistics from the London School of Economics and Political Science, London; B Comm from the University of Sydney, Sydney.
Research interests: probabilistic analysis of nonlinear and chaotic dynamical systems; Ergodic theory; applications of dynamical systems mathematical research in dynamical systems.
Samuele Soraggi, PhD student
Department of Mathematical Sciences
samuele@math.ku.dk
Project: KU2016 project - The genomic history of Denmark
Starting date: 2nd of February, 2015
Supervisors: Carsten Wiuf (supervisor), Anders Albrechtsen (cosupervisor) and Eske Willerslev (affiliated supervisor at the Center for GeoGenetik for the KU2016 project).
Educational background: Bachelor's degree (2009-2012) in mathematics and Master's degree in applied mathematics (2012-2014) at the University of Genova, Italy.
Research interests: Statistic, Bioinformatic, population genetics and machine learning.
Sophie Møller, PhD student
Department of Biomedical Sciences
sophiem@sund.ku.dk
Project: Gap junction mediated signaling in the juxtaglomerular apparatus
Starting date: 01.08.2015
Supervisors: Charlotte Mehlin Sørensen (Dept of Biomedical Sciences), and Niels-Henrik Holstein-Rathlou (Novo Nordisk Foundation).
Educational background: BS Pre-Medical Studies with a minor in Biology (Hawaii Pacific University; Hawaii, USA). MSc Human Biology (University of Copenhagen).
Research interests: Renal physiology. Vascular physiology. Hypertension. Intercellular coupling.
Steven Paul Blurton, Postdoc
Department of Psychology
steven.blurton@psy.ku.dk
Project: Modeling visual perception over time
Starting date: 16.10.2014
Supervisors: Søren Kyllingsbæk and Claus Bundesen (Dept of Psychology).
Educational background: Diploma in Psychology (University of Regensburg, Germany), PhD in Psychology (University of Regensburg, Germany)
Research interests: Stochastic Processes, Cognitive Modeling, Mathematical Psychology
Troels Mikkelsen, PhD student
Niels Bohr Institute / Center for Ice and Climate
troelsmikkelsen@gmail.com
Project: Oscillations and bifurcations in complex systems such as the climate.
Starting date: 15.02.2014.
Supervisors: Peter Ditlevsen (NBI/Center for Ice and Climate), and Susanne Ditlevsen (Department of Mathematical Sciences).
Educational background: M.Sc. in physics from NBI, 2014.
Research interests: Dynamical systems, complex systems, climate models, climate research.
Meet some of our key researchers
We proudly present one of our key researchers from each of the seven teams:
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Anders Rahbek, Department of Economics: Knowledge sharing is the way forward |
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Olga Sosnovtseva, Department of Biomedical Sciences: A model of the kidney |
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Rune Berg, Department of Neuroscience and Pharmacology: In love with the spinal cord |
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Susanne Ditlevsen, Department of Mathematical Sciences: A common language |
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Søren Kyllingsbæk, Department of Psychology: Mind biology |
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Theis Lange, Department of Public Health, Section of Biostatistics: At the core |
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Thomas Hamelryck, |
See the list of publications based on research performed as part of the project.
In the Acknowledgement in your papers please write:
"The work is part of the Dynamical Systems Interdisciplinary Network, University of Copenhagen."
Funded by UCPH
DSIN was made possible by a 4-year grant from the University of Copenhagen. It was one of the 18 research initiatives of the UCHP Excellence Programme for Interdisciplinary Research.
(DANSK: KUs Stjerneprogrammer).
Project: Dynamical Systems Interdisciplinary Network
Principal Investigator:
Professor Susanne Ditlevsen
Start: 1 August 2014
End: 31 December 2017