The Mathematics of Complexity Science and Systems Biology

Complexity Science is the study of systems with many interdependent components. Its remit spans a wide range of areas, from physical and technological to biological and social systems. One large and important such area is Systems Biology, the study of living organisms from the point of view of systems rather than individual components. We believe that these subjects depend heavily on Mathematics for their healthy development, and that conversely, they provide rich sources of stimulation for new Mathematics.We will run an intensive year of research workshop and visitor activity as the Warwick Mathematics Research Centre Symposium topic for the academic year 2009/10, to summarise the state of play, expose the main challenges and develop key ideas in a range of topics in these areas. The main workshop subjects will be Networks: dynamics and flows, Information extraction from complex data sets, From molecules to bodies: spanning levels of biological organization in medicine, Space-time Gibbs phases for spatially extended systems, Non-equilibrium dynamics of spatially-extended interacting particle systems, Ecology, epidemiology and evolution: biological processes and artificial analogues, Game theory for finance, social and biological sciences, Dendrites, neurones and networks: space and stochasticity in the brain, Clocks, switches and signals, and Spatio-temporal dynamics challenges from fluorescence data. The Symposium year will be followed by focussed workshops in a subsequent year to capitalise on promising themes that emerge.