The International School and Conference on Network Science, also called NetSci, is an annual conference focusing on networks. It is organized yearly since 2006 by the Network Science Society. Physicists are especially prominently represented among the participants, though people from other backgrounds attend as well. The study of networks expanded at the end of the twentieth century, with increasing citation of some seminal papers.[1]
Following this increase in interest from the scientific community, network science was examined by the National Research Council (NRC), the arm of the US National Academies in charge of offering policy recommendations to the US government. NRC assembled two panels, resulting in recommendations summarized in two NRC Reports,[2][3] offering a definition of the field of network science. These reports not only documented the emergence of a new research field, but highlighted the field’s role for science, national competitiveness and security. The NetSci conference series was set up in 2006 to address the need of the new and emerging highly interdisciplinary network science community to meet and exchange ideas. The NetSci conference has been a yearly event since then. In 2015, a shorter regional conference, called NetSci-X, was added.
History
The formal NetSci conference series was preceded by several meetings:
CNLS Annual Conference 2003: Networks, Structure, Dynamics and Function,[6] May 12–26, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Organized by Zoltán Toroczkai, Eli Ben-Naim, Hans Frauenfelder, Pieter Swart, supported by Los Alamos National Laboratory.
Aveiro Conference CNET 2004 August 29–September 2 (2004)
NetSci 2017 June 19–23, held in Indianapolis, USA, and organized by the Indiana University Network Science Institute, with Olaf Sporns and Filippo Menczer as general co-chairs. The 2017 conference was the largest yet, with 680 registrations from 29 countries. The event featured three keynote speakers, 10 plenary speakers, 22 pre-conference satellite workshops and 23 technical sessions with about 130 oral presentations and 218 posters.[9]
NetSci 2018 June 1–15, 2018, Paris, France Organised by A. Barrat and Vittoria Colizza
NetSci 2020 ONLINE September 17–25 (before COVID-19 pandemic was originally planned for July 6–10), Rome, Italy Organised by Guido Caldarelli, Giulio Cimini, Tommaso Gili, Andrea Nicolai
The NetSci conference generally starts with two days of satellite meetings organized by different people, and classes offering an introduction into different aspects of network science. The formal NetSci conference starts on Wednesday, and has a series of keynote speakers, invited speakers, and contributed talks in parallel sections.
^National Research Council. Network Science. Washington, DC, The National Academies Press, 2005.
^National Research Council. Strategy for an Army Center for Network Science, Technology, and Experimentation. Washington, DC, The National Academies Press, 2007.
^Statistical Mechanics of Complex Networks, Lectures Notes in Physics, Vol. 625 (2003)
^European Physical Journal B Vol. 38, Number 2, March II, 2004
