Albert-László Barabási - Network science, breakthrough orientation, and a life made around discovery
Albert-László Barabási thinks in networks and his scholarship, as his life, is embodiment of the explorative, imaginative, and generative nature of networks. It would be difficult to imagine a person better suited to steward us through the innate and seemingly universal tendency of things to connect to each other and all of its implications.
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Albert-László, or László as he goes by, is endlessly curious, fascinated and learned about topics ranging from the structure of the brain to treating diseases using network medicine, from the emergence of success in art to how does science really works. He's among the pioneers of the modern field of network science, which is helping unveil the hidden order behind various complex systems.
Professor Barabási is the Robert Gray Dodge Professor of Network Science at Northeastern University, where in 2004 he founded the Center for Complex Network Research. He also holds an appointment in the Department of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Prior to joining Northeastern, he was the Emil T. Hofman Professor of Physics at Notre Dame, a position that made him the youngest endowed professor in the history of the prestigious institution.
He received a PhD in 1994 from Boston University, and completed physics and engineering degress from the University of Bucharest and a masters from (et-vos lorand) Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest. Across his education he has studied complex systems, physics, and statistical mechanics.
To experience how László's mind makes connections is as exhilarating as it is illuminating, in his work and in how he speaks and writes. His is an imaginative approach to the world, a sensibility befitting the immense science he undertakes as well as his winsome creative ambitions.