Four weeks filled with lectures, scientific discussions, and reddish sunsets—this was Social Physics and Complexity Lab (SPAC) PhD student Sara Mesquita’s experience at the Santa Fe Institute's Complex Systems Summer School (SFI CSSS). Read on as Sara shares more about her experience
More than a month has passed since I returned from the SFI CSSS in New Mexico, USA, but the experience still resonates deeply with me. To tell the truth, it was the science that took me there, but the combination with the landscapes ensured I never fully left.
Fifty people from diverse backgrounds and life stages were selected to spend an intensive month, from June 9th to July 5th, delving into complexity science. We arrived at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA), a beautiful place that became our home for the entire program, and settled into our dorms. From that moment on, we were never far from a meaningful scientific discussion or cultural exchange. It was there that we attended most of the lectures, brainstormed and executed our group projects, and enjoyed the most stunning sunsets.
Trained as a Biochemist, with a master's in Bioengineering, and later transitioning to Bioinformatics and Global Public Health to focus on health-related data, I was first introduced to complexity science when I joined the SPAC group in 2019 and began attending conferences like NetSci, the Conference on Complex Systems (CSS), and Complex Networks. Despite my efforts to expand my knowledge through self-study, I lacked a holistic view and formal training in the field. I still do, but the main takeaway from the CSSS was finally gaining that comprehensive understanding I had been seeking through the curated content the summer school provided.
The lectures that stood out to me, in no particular order, were: Nonlinear Dynamics by Elizabeth Bradley, Networks by Laurent Hébert-Dufresne, Prediction Markets by Rajiv Sethi (who made markets surprisingly fun!), Fractals and Scaling by Dave Feldman, and Ecological and Mutualistic Networks by Fernanda Valdovinos. I also frequently revisit my notes from C. Brandon Ogbunu's talk. He not only beautifully simplified complex concepts from evolutionary biology but also demonstrated how one can be a wet lab scientist, conduct impactful public health research, and creatively communicate science. I want to emphasize not just the ability to do it all (it’s okay if we can’t), but the boldness to choose to do it all, refusing to fit into one scientific box. One of the projects he highlighted was the "COVID-19 Amplified Racial Disparities in the U.S. Criminal Legal System," where he and his colleagues showed that, despite a reduction in overall prison numbers, the proportion of Black individuals in the prison population increased. This trend is largely attributed to systemic issues, such as longer average sentencing lengths for Black and Latino individuals, which, combined with decreased new admissions during the pandemic, led to a higher proportion of these communities remaining incarcerated.
On Fridays, we headed to the SFI to interact with SFI researchers and seek support for the projects we were working on. The Santa Fe Institute is located on a small hill, surrounded by desert-like nature. It reminded me of Alentejo, a region in Portugal with a similar landscape, and I couldn’t help but ask myself how great it would be to have such an institute to inspire and support researchers in my own country. Apart from debates, there we also attended lectures, with Geoffrey West and Sara Imari Walker offering a more physics-oriented perspective on scaling and the origins of life, respectively, which definitely sparked some interesting conversations afterward.
Beyond the scientific focus of the summer school—though it was impossible to fully separate the two, as scientific discussions continued wherever we went—some of us also went on various excursions. We visited the Great Sand Dunes National Park in Colorado, made several local trips to downtown Santa Fe to enjoy the city's artistic culture and the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, and experienced a memorable night of stargazing in the desert of Abiquiú. One particularly fun evening had us as improv actors (narrators might be more accurate) for a few hours as we interpreted _Arcadia_, a play by English playwright Tom Stoppard that explores the relationship between past and present, order and disorder, certainty and uncertainty.
Did I fully understand everything that was taught during this summer school? Absolutely not. Will I apply everything I’ve learned to my own research? Most probably not. But I have no doubt this experience made me a better scientist by expanding my horizons and reminding me how fun scientific discovery can be.