Critical Transitions in Complex Systems

Many complex systems such as turbulent thermo-fluid systems, climate systems, financial markets, power grids, infectious diseases exhibit critical transitions where the system shifts abruptly from one state to another. Such critical transitions can have undesirable or even catastrophic consequences including failure of space missions, power blackouts, extreme weather, extinction of species in ecosystems and sudden crash of financial markets. Our team strives to unravel the science behind these transitions in diverse systems and develop translational technologies. We work toward developing technologies to anticipate critical transitions and extreme events and mitigate the effect of these transitions through smart control actions.