Santa Fe Institute

Bio

I am ICREA research professor (the Catalan Institute for research and Advanced Studies). I am now at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra , where I'm the head of the COMPLEX SYSTEMS LAB. Since 1997, I am External Professor of the Santa Fe Institute (New Mexico, USA), a great place to do research in a truly interdisciplinary environment, full of smart people. I am also member of the Council of the European Complex Systems Society. I am member of the editorial board of several international peer reviewed journals. I completed a five-year degree in Physics and another 5-year degree in Biology at the University of Barcelona and received my PhD in Physics in the Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya.
One of my main research interests is understanding the possible presence of universal patterns of organization in complex systems, from prebiotic replicators to evolved artificial objects. Key questions are how robust structures develop, how information is incorporated into these structures and how computation emerges. I am also interested in how to determine what are the contributions of selection, chance and self-organization to the evolution of complexity. In order to explore these questions, my Lab studies a wide range of systems, from natural to artificial. One of our main goals is searching for the principles of organization responsible for the emergence of fundamental components of complexity, including the origins of self-reproduction, development, life cycles, computational processes and multicellularity. Part of these studies are funded by a James McDonnell Foundation Award. Our work has been featured in newspapers as well as several popular and technical books. Some part of this work is done in collaboration with researchers of the Santa Fe Institute were I usually interact with the night crew. I like reading, painting and music. I love Barcelona (best city in the world). I have the pleasure of sharing my research with a team of great (and a bit crazy) people.