Many real-world phenomena and parts of the infrastructure of our society can be phrased in terms of networks. An electricity network for example describes how electricity can flow.
Say you are living in Eindhoven and would like to spend a day in Amsterdam: what better way to get there than taking the train? Before your train departs, a whole logistic operation has taken place in the headquarters of the railway company to make this trip possible.
On Friday 24th of September Professor Ton Koonen received a royal distinction “Ridder in the Orde van de Nederlandse Leeuw” during the symposium “Optical Networks – communication fabric of our society”, preceding his valedictory lecture “Light work(s)”.
Phenomena like social cohesion and polarisation emerge from individual interactions on the social network of relationships between people. So, what does this network look like?
At this very moment, the emergent science of DNA self-assembly is giving birth to a new field of mathematics that might be called DNA-mathematics. Cleverly constructed DNA molecules will self-assemble into pre-determined complex structures when placed in solution together.
