Imagine trying to avoid a car crash. Every split second you spend deliberating what to do, you waste precious time needed to alter your course. Any delay between your brain’s perception of danger and your foot’s contact with the brake could mean the difference between life or death. Members of Northeastern’s Laboratory for the Modeling […]

Considering how many factors contribute to the worldwide spread of airborne infectious diseases, forecasting pandemics can be a daunting task. In an attempt to reflect that complex reality, Northeastern’s Laboratory for the Modeling of Biological and Sociotechnical Systems (MOBS Lab) has developed a new, data-driven model that factors in patterns of interpersonal behavior down to the state or province […]

Northeastern’s doctoral students can forge global networks and pursue experiential learning in an international environment thanks to new agreements with a pair of widely recognized universities in Asia and Europe. The global experiential doctoral program between Northeastern, the University of Hong Kong, and Sapienza University of Rome is interdisciplinary flexibility, which allows students to pursue doctoral degrees in […]

SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, was circulating in major U.S. cities as early as January, says Alessandro Vespignani, director of Northeastern’s Network Science Institute. And if we want to keep our communities safe going forward, we need to understand how we missed a virus that was right under our noses.

After days of closures and requests—or orders—to stay home, many people caught in the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic are wondering if these efforts will be enough. Network scientist Alessandro Vespignani says the answer depends on the ways that local, regional, and federal governments use the time.

“Either the screening, detection, and isolation in China will be able to contain the epidemic there, or it will be a global issue,” says Alessandro Vespignani, Sternberg Family Distinguished University Professor at Northeastern. “And this will be decided in the next couple of weeks.”

The second-largest Ebola outbreak on record began in late July 2018 in the North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Northeastern professor Alessandro Vespignani and his colleagues are working with the WHO to help model and forecast different aspects of the disease.

An international team led by Northeastern’s Alessandro Vespignani has developed a unique computational model that uses Twitter to project the spread of the seasonal flu in real time. With it, public health agencies can plan ahead, allocating medical resources and launching preventative care campaigns.

New research from Northeastern professor Alessandro Vespignani finds that the number of reported Zika cases in the U.S. may be just the tip of the iceberg due to widespread underreporting. The study also models the predicted spread of Zika across the Americas through 2017.

As the Zika virus continues its inexorable spread, a panel of faculty members discussed how they—and by extension we—can be part of the global solution.

Can a flow of information across Twitter signal when a momentous event is about to occur? Northeastern’s Alessandro Vespignani and an interdisciplinary group of scientists developed a method to find out. Their findings represent an initial step in constructing models to detect trouble before it’s too late.

The Network Science Institute, home of the nation’s first doctoral program in network science, brings together an interdisciplinary team of renowned Northeastern scholars to plumb the structure and function of systems and develop intervention strategies to improve the health and security of people around the world.

California’s Department of Public Health announced last week that a child contracted the plague after visiting Yosemite National Park in July, the third reported case this year. With the plague’s recent return to the news, we took a look at some myths and truths about the centuries-old disease.

College of Science professor Alessandro Vespignani, a world-renowned network scientist, is working to forecast the spread of the flu.