@complexity
This week, @nature.com published an article on how I use mathematical models to study what is otherwise very hard to measure: the scale and dynamics of cartels.
How a mathematician is cracking open Mexico's powerful drug cartels.
👇🧮🧑🔬
www.nature.com/articles/d41...
Conferences are pricey, so not everyone can attend.
@css-conference.bsky.social will offer an #OpenArms grant for researchers working on low- & middle-income countries, covering registration, travel, and extras.
I am happy to be part of this community!
Details:
ccs26.cssociety.org#open-arms-gr...
En México, los homicidios van a la baja, pero el suicidio "creció" 130 % y los accidentes 200%.
@jacobodayan.bsky.social en Animal Político.
👇
animalpolitico.com/seguridad/ho...
Conferences are pricey, so not everyone can attend.
@css-conference.bsky.social will offer an #OpenArms grant for researchers working on low- & middle-income countries, covering registration, travel, and extras.
I am happy to be part of this community!
Details:
ccs26.cssociety.org#open-arms-gr...
Automated vehicles, even if they are shared among users, tend to increase the total miles traveled by car by more than 5%.
That means, at least 5% more tires, asphalt, breaks, and pollution.
Still a few days left to apply!
The 15th Illicit Networks Workshop will be hosted by @csh.ac.at in Vienna on June 29–30, 2026.
Themes include organised crime, gangs, trafficking, corruption, and more.
👉 Details & submission info: illicitnetworksworkshop.com
Graphic showing all the many costs of suburban brawl, explaining how many costs are hidden and indirect costs, and sharing stats and data. Prepared by the Sustainable Prosperity Institute.
Suburban Sprawl may seem cheap, but even the costs we CAN count are far too high, and we ALL pay them.
HT Smart Prosperity Institute #UrbanTruth institute.smartprosperity.ca/library/publ...
Nemesio Oseguera, El Mencho, fue abatido hace unas horas. Y con ello, se han desatado múltiples narcobloqueos en todo el país.
Aquí puedes consultar un mapeo de los bloqueos registrados.
Un gran trabajo de Aleph.
ui.aliado.alephri.com
Fosas sin contar: Plataforma ciudadana reporta subregistro de fosas clandestinas
fabricadeperiodismo.com/noticias/pla...
Why is there such variation in the birds encountered as you go up or down a mountain? New paper in #ScienceAdvances examines how climate and ecological interactions drive bird distributions in mountains throughout the year:
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
1/10 ⬇️
Map of downtown SLC, where 29% of land is off-street parking
Utah Legislature to SLC: "Don't you dare rip out any street parking; there's nowhere to park downtown."
Downtown SLC:
As so often, the best medicine against online hysteria is a dose of fresh air—maybe a leisurely walk along the Thames
We kicked off the workshop with our first invited talk by the incredible Rafael Prieto-Curiel, who shared insights from his work studying how cartels operate in Mexico, sparking lively discussion and great questions. A fantastic start, and more to come!
🎤 We are delighted to announce our first of #WWCS26 speaker: Rafael Prieto-Curiel (CSH Vienna)!
With experience at Oxford, UCL & as Director of Strategic Analysis in Mexico City, he applies complexity to violence, migration, mobility & urban dynamics. See you in Mallorca! ❄️🌍
El artículo está en inglés, pero en el mismo enlace hay una traducción íntegra al español.
Además, escribimos este artículo en Nexos, con los resultados principales de nuestro estudio: "Después de los abrazos y los balazos".
🪅
redaccion.nexos.com.mx/despues-de-l...
Su enorme reclutamiento es reflejo de políticas sociales y de seguridad fallidas.
Durante años, hemos invertido poco y mal en seguridad y justicia. En 2022, por ejemplo, de todos los homicidios en la CDMX, nadie fue condenado.
www.mexicoevalua.org/wp-content/u...
Debido a los costos (directos e indirectos), la violencia en México costó en 2024 casi 18% del PIB del país. Una enorme parte de ese costo es atribuible a los cárteles y a sus luchas por el poder.
www.visionofhumanity.org/wp-content/u...
Si los cárteles son el quinto empleador y el principal reclutador, ¿deberíamos defenderlos por el empleo que generan?
Por supuesto que no.
El impacto que tienen es desastroso. Y debemos enfocar nuestros esfuerzos en reducir su fuerza y su capacidad de reclutamiento.
Hace unos meses se publicó nuestro estudio en @science.org sobre los cárteles en México.
Nuestros resultados muestran que:
- Juntos, los cárteles son el quinto empleador del país
- Reclutan 350 jóvenes por semana
www.science.org/stoken/autho...
In 2026, I am launching a vlog, For the Love of Science, about working aspects of being a scientist - the joys and challenges, the practical aspects and mental and emotional qualities it involves. It's on YouTube (at @NAChristakis) and Instagram (at @OnTheLoveofScience)
www.youtube.com/@NAChristakis
We are excited to welcome @rafaelprietocuriel.bsky.social as a 2026 keynote for IC2S2. His work at the Complexity Science Hub in Vienna, as well as his work with OECD - OCDE and the The World Bank focuses on mobility, migration and urban dynamics:
Constructing better cities could result in approximately 220 million more people having access to water.
Here is our article covered by @newsweek.com.
www.newsweek.com/cities-water...
Compact urban design is key to securing water and sanitation, a new study by CSH and the World Bank in #NatureCities shows. With horizontal city growth, 220M fewer people could have access to piped water and 190M to sewage by 2050, says lead author @rafaelprietocuriel.bsky.social
shorturl.at/WFhvr
Big fan of this paper, which I reviewed for Nature Cities.
If you didn't think urban form and water access were related...
Additionally, Liuhuaying Yang, from @csh.ac.at, has created Urban Thirst, a fantastic visualization that captures the different aspects of water availability in cities.
💧🏙️
vis.csh.ac.at/urban-thirst/
In our latest paper, with colleagues from the World Bank, we quantified how urban form shapes water access.
Compact city growth could deliver piped water to 220 million more people and sewage services to 190 million more people in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
💧🏙️
www.nature.com/articles/s44...
Cities are often seen as hotbeds of violence, with the assumption that bigger cities are more dangerous. New research by @rafaelprietocuriel.bsky.social ( @csh.ac.at ) and @ronaldomenezes.bsky.social ( @exeter.ac.uk ), published in #NatComms, highlights that 𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐦𝐚𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬.
shorturl.at/ii3jm
Large cities are often assumed to be more violent, but our review shows there’s nothing universal about urban violence.
In our new study, @ronaldomenezes.bsky.social and I show that isolated cities tend to experience higher rates of violence against civilians.
www.nature.com/articles/s41...
Our new study challenges assumptions about urban violence in Africa.
Surprising finding: isolated cities face 4x higher violence risk than large, connected cities. Size matters less than connectivity.
Amazing work with @rafaelprietocuriel.bsky.social
nature.com/articles/s41467-025-65728-6
Instead of looking only at city size, we analysed the levels of isolation of a city (quantified either by the degree of a city or its weighted betweenness) and detected that people in isolated cities suffer a much higher violence rate.
