Contact network analysis of Covid-19 in tourist areas——Based on 333 confirmed cases in China

The spread of infectious diseases is highly related to the structure of human networks. Analyzing the contact network of patients can help clarify the path of virus transmission. Based on confirmed cases of COVID-19 in two major tourist provinces in southern China (Hainan and Yunnan), this study analyzed the epidemiological characteristics and dynamic contact network structure of patients in these two places. Results show that: (1) There are more female patients than males in these two districts and most are imported cases, with an average age of 45 years. Medical measures were given in less than 3 days after symptoms appeared. (2) The whole contact network of the two areas is disconnected. There are a small number of transmission chains in the network. The average values of degree centrality, betweenness centrality, and PageRank index are small. Few patients have a relatively high contact number. There is no superspreader in the network.

Spontaneous emergence of leadership patterns drives synchronization in complex human networks

Synchronization of human networks is fundamental in many aspects of human endeavour. Recently, much research effort has been spent on analyzing how motor coordination emerges in human groups (from rocking chairs to violin players) and how it is affected by coupling structure and strength. Here we uncover the spontaneous emergence of leadership (based on physical signaling during group interaction) as a crucial factor steering the occurrence of synchronization in complex human networks where individuals perform a joint motor task. In two experiments engaging participants in an arm movement synchronization task, in the physical world as well as in the digital world, we found that specific patterns of leadership emerged and increased synchronization performance. Precisely, three patterns were found, involving a subtle interaction between phase of the motion and amount of influence. Such patterns were independent of the presence or absence of physical interaction, and persisted across manipulated spatial configurations. Our results shed light on the mechanisms that drive coordination and leadership in human groups, and are consequential for the design of interactions with artificial agents, avatars or robots, where social roles can be determinant for a successful interaction.

Human Networks and Toxic Relationships

We devise a theoretical model to shed light on the dynamics leading to toxic relationships. We investigate what intervention policy people could advocate to protect themselves and to reduce suffocating addiction in order to escape from physical or psychological abuses either inside family or at work. Assuming that the toxic partner’s behavior is exogenous and that the main source of addiction is income or wealth we find that an asymptotically stable equilibrium with positive love is always possible. The existence of a third unconditionally reciprocating part as a benchmark, i.e., presence of another partner, support from family, friends, private organizations in helping victims, plays an important role in reducing the toxic partner’s appeal. Analyzing our model, we outline the conditions for the best policy to heal from a toxic relationship.

An Eco-Industrial Park-Based Method for Net Zero Community Creation

Much emphasis is placed on the role of Net Zero Communities (NZCs) in achieving a sustainable future. Systems research on the topic, including the application of bio-inspired techniques already used on other human networks, is currently hindered by the lack of case studies documenting the structure and quantity of energy, water, and waste flows within realistic NZCs. This work proposes and preliminarily tests a method of generating a database of hypothetical-realistic NZCs by expanding the system boundaries for well-documented Eco-industrial Park (EIP) networks. The expansion includes residential and commercial actors from the community surrounding the EIP. Past studies using Ecological Network Analysis (ENA) to improve the environmental and economic performance of these EIPs have resulted in a quantitative database of case studies. Combining these industrial hubs to nearby residential, commercial, agricultural, etc. actors can generate potential multi-use networks on which similar design work can be conducted. Three EIP to NZC cases are generated and analyzed focusing on their system structure. Cyclicity, an ENA metric used to quantify the presence and complexity of cyclic pathways in a network, has been shown to promote the efficient use of resources in both biological and human networks. Cyclicity values for the original EIP networks, the community additions, and the potential NZC case studies reveals that there are many meaningful interactions that occur between actors that are only visible once the system boundaries are expanded to the NZC level. This offers a glimpse into the potential benefits of approaching the NZ problem, and sustainable living more generally, on a system scale — an analysis that will be further enabled by the generation of an NZC database initiated by this work.

Between stability and change: Tensions in the Norwegian electric mobility transition

Norway, where a majority of new cars sold are currently electric, has emerged as a rich location for studying transitions towards electric mobility. Such transitions have often been conceptualized through a Multi-Level Perspective (MLP), which generally designates the technology as a disruptive niche with potential to upend the obdurate and problematic automobilty regime. Drawing upon Actor-Network Theory (ANT), this article re-examines this designation and provides nuance to theories of sustainable transition. This change in perspective enable us to re-centre user practices and investigate how electric vehicle drivers operate within complex human/non-human networks. Rather than viewing stability and change as the result of interactions between pre-determined levels, ANT allows us to explore how stability and change is co-produced in a multitude of locations. Drawing upon qualitative interview data, the article finds that new configurations of users and technology are currently emerging, elucidating dynamics of sociotechnical change, while cultural and geographical barriers to more radical mobility shifts are equally pronounced. As such, electric mobility currently finds itself between reinforcing the automobility system, while also engendering exciting new associations between drivers, cars and the world outside the windshield.

Age-related change in adult chimpanzee social network integration

Background: Social isolation is a key risk factor for the onset and progression of age-related disease and mortality in humans, yet older people commonly have narrowing social networks. Few models explain why human networks shrink with age, despite the risk that small networks and isolation pose. We evaluate models grounded in a life history perspective by studying social aging in wild chimpanzees, which are long-lived and show physical decline with age. Methodology: We applied social network analysis to examine age-related changes in social integration in a 7+ year mixed-longitudinal dataset comprised of 38 wild adult chimpanzees (22 F, 16 M) in the Kanyawara community in the Kibale National Park, Uganda. Metrics of social integration included social attractivity and overt effort (directed degree and strength), gregariousness (undirected strength), social roles (betweenness and local transitivity), and embeddedness (eigenvector centrality) in grooming and spatial association networks. Results: Males reduced overt social effort yet increased in attractivity, roles in cliques, and embeddedness. Females were overall less integrated than males, and their decreased integration with age suggested social avoidance. Effects of age were largely independent of rank. Both sexes maintained highly repeatable inter-individual differences in several aspects of integration, particularly among mixed-sex partners. Conclusions and implications: As in humans, chimpanzees experience age-related declines in social effort. However, important facets of integration aged more similarly to humans in non-industrialized vs. industrialized societies, suggesting an evolutionary social mismatch between conserved declines in effort and dynamics of industrialized society. Lastly, individual and sex differences have the potential to be important mediators of successful social aging in chimpanzees, as in humans.