CPIN2: Critical Phenomena In Networks

Critical phenomena describe system behavior near phase transitions, where small parameter changes can produce qualitative shifts between order and disorder. While well understood in physics and random graph models, criticality in adaptive, functional, and meaning-bearing networks—including biological, neural, technological, and social systems—remains an open frontier.

CPIN positions critical phenomena as a unifying research program across network science, bringing together natural scientists, complexity scientists, computational social scientists, and interdisciplinary researchers to examine: 

• the transfer of classical theories (percolation, renormalization, phase transitions) to evolving networks,
• links between canonical network structures and critical dynamics,
• temporal and adaptive processes in link streams and multilayer networks,
• mechanisms of self-organized criticality,
• control parameters and functional interpretations of criticality in non-physical systems. 

Emerging empirical evidence—from fractal dynamics and scaling laws to cascades and tipping points—suggests that critical phenomena may constitute a central organizing principle of complex adaptive networks. CPIN aims to consolidate this emerging research direction and foster sustained interdisciplinary collaboration through a continuing symposium series. 

Report from CPIN1: https://doi.org/10.34879/gesisblog.2025.98