Marta González is a Venezuelan-American physicist and complexity scientist whose research explores the dynamics of human mobility, urban systems, and sustainability through the lens of statistical physics and network science. She is a professor of civil and environmental engineering and city and regional planning at the University of California, Berkeley, where she also serves as associate director of the Transportation Sustainability Research Center. González is internationally recognized for pioneering the use of large-scale mobility data to better understand cities and inform public policy. In this wide-ranging InterDialogue, González reflects on her journey from physics into complexity science and urban research, explaining how statistical physics provides powerful tools for understanding human mobility and the collective dynamics of cities. We discuss the emergence of urban science as an interdisciplinary field, the opportunities and limitations of mobile phone and mobility datasets, and how these data can improve transportation planning, climate adaptation, and the design of more resilient and sustainable cities. González also explores the challenges of translating scientific research into public policy, including questions of data access, privacy, and collaboration between researchers, governments, and industry. We further examine the future of urban mobility, autonomous vehicles, and clean energy, as well as the importance of international collaboration and expanding scientific capacity across the Global South. Finally, she reflects on the broader promise of complexity science for addressing some of the most pressing social and environmental challenges facing rapidly urbanizing societies. Timestamps 0:00 – Introduction and Marta González’s path into complexity science 5:01 – From statistical physics to human mobility research 10:18 – Mobile phone data and the emergence of urban science 15:42 – Sustainable cities, climate adaptation, and resilience 20:24 – Privacy, data access, and international collaboration 25:42 – Using complexity science to inform urban policy 29:32 – Measuring the impact of remote work...

Is self-organization the answer to the foundational question of why life exhibits such complexity? And can it also serve as a guiding framework for how best to save complex webs of biodiversity amid the onslaughts of the modern world? Self-organization exists throughout nature and socioeconomic structures. It refers to the spontaneous emergence of collective, complex order within a disordered system, due to localized interactions that follow simple rules, and occurring without external controls. While conceptually abstract, given that uncertainty lies at its core, the applications of self-organization are everywhere. Advancing our understanding of the non-linear processes within complex systems that drive self-organization is also becoming increasingly important for developing evidence-based policies in a world defined by interdependence and escalating stressors. Indigenous cultures, such as those that live within complex socio-ecological systems in the Amazon ecoregion, have long embraced these principles of uncertainty, interconnectedness, and non-linear dynamics. How will their wisdom, experience, and models of socio-ecological systems integrate with evidence-based policies for protecting the Amazon ecoregion? Safeguarding the Amazon is one of our world’s most pressing, complex, and vital global challenges. Among the strategies gaining traction, supported by increasing financial investment, is the intriguing proposition to transform a portion of the region’s immense biodiversity into a sustainable “bioeconomy.” However, these proposals, and the policy makers responsible for negotiating their implementation across boundaries and cultures, often lack an understanding of how both economies and ecologies self-organize and scale. Data-driven models of self-organization and critical collective phenomena in the natural world and within traditional Indigenous sociocultural structures, along with adaptive context-based frameworks, can help guide the transboundary development of a decentralized and circular socio-bioeconomy for the Amazon. Self-Organized Criticality and the Edge of Chaos Pioneering research on self-organized criticality (SOC) began in the 1980s and was made accessible to a wider audience by...

Eng: The articulation of knowledge, expertise, and experiences from different social actors is essential for the identification of alternatives and solutions for the management of natural heritage, its sustainable use, and equitable exploitation. In this intergroup we focus on wetland and coastal socio-ecological systems, in Colombia and beyond, but invite those with diverse backgrounds, perspectives and expertise, to join. Esp: La articulación de conocimientos, pericia y experiencia de diferentes actores sociales es esencial para la identificación de alternativas y soluciones para la gestión del patrimonio natural, su uso sostenible y su explotacion equitativo. En este intergrupo nos centramos en los los sistemas socioecológicos costeros y de los humedales, tanto en Colombia como en el resto del mundo, pero invitamos a unirse a personas con diversos antecedentes, perspectivas y experiencia.

In a complex and rapidly evolving technological, socio-economic and geopolitical landscape that is focused on a global “sustainable energy transition,” increased electromobility based on lithium batteries is often stated as a key objective. However, unbeknownst to the public, policy makers and most researchers alike, lithium in its enriched isotopic forms (6Li and 7Li) holds tremendous added value beyond its use in batteries. This is especially true in both present and future nuclear technologies. For those countries with large lithium reserves that are being prospected for rapid lithium exploitation in order to fuel the growing global electromobility sector, it is important to be aware of these added value uses when considering plans for expanding lithium extraction (plans that also hold negative environmental externalities, such as prodigious water use and contamination). Argentina – which has an established nuclear energy and research sector, as well as a current administration that seems committed to rapidly depleting the national lithium reserves – serves as a strong and dynamic case study for the importance of crafting long-term, science-based and sustainable policies around the exploitation and isotopic separation of lithium. Argentina owns almost a third of the lithium reserves in South America which, together with those of Chile and Bolivia, represent more than half of the world’s lithium availability. Battery-grade lithium carbonate (Li2CO3) is produced from the Puna brines in the Andes of Northwestern Argentina – it is exported and only a small fraction remains in Argentina as royalties (around 3%) and the declared profits of the mining companies.  This article analyzes the use of lithium isotopes (6Li and 7Li) in fission and fusion nuclear reactors and in nuclear technology devices, such as scintillation plates, neutron detectors and shields. These uses of lithium in nuclear technologies have the potential to add value to Argentina’s limited lithium reserves...

Marcelino Sánchez Noé is an Indigenous leader and representative of the Ticuna People from the Colombian Amazon. He is the former general secretary and legal representative of the CIMTAR (Cabildo Indígena Mayor de Tarapacá) Association and has served as an Ethnoeducator in the Indigenous community of Caña Brava along the Cotuhue River, where he currently resides. This beautiful territory is deep in the Amazon Rainforest within the Putumayo River Basin, and near the border with Brazil. Since 2021 he has served as a senior advisor of the Greater Indigenous Council of Tarapacá and has participated in various intercultural collaborations with the Colombian State and with non-governmental organizations. His professional background is as a teacher and technician in comprehensive early childhood care, with a degree from SENA. In our Interdialogue we spoke about the beautiful culture and ancestral territory of the Tikuna, and how they have recently been roped into Colombia’s ongoing conflict, especially in relation to illegal gold mining. We then spoke about the central role of the “Chagra” (traditional rotational agriculture) for the Ticuna, and how circular bioeconomics focused on the Chagra and Non-timber forest products, as well as an appropriate integration of Western science and technology, can create sustainable livelihoods for the Ticuna. We also focused our conversation on the vital importance of autonomy and mutually respectful intercultural dialogue and collaborations, in order preserve both traditional cultures and the wider Andes-Amazon ecoregion. Note: This Interdialogue was recorded in Spanish and is subtitled in English. Timestamps 00:00:00 – Introduction 00:07:41 – Ancestral territory of the Ticuna and its place in Colombia’s ongoing conflict 00:11:53 – The importance of traditional knowledge, language and autonomous governance 00:16:52 – Bioeconomics, sustainable livelihoods and the central role of the “Chagra” 00:24:17 – Water, energy, communication, and the importance of weaving together science, technology...

Horacio Corti is an Argentinian physical chemist, a full professor at the University of Buenos Aires, and a researcher and long-time member of Argentina’s National Atomic Energy Commission.  Corti has researched a wide range of condensed matter and material physics phenomena over his long and productive career, from membranes and nanoscale microscopy, to applications of density functional theory and energy storage systems.  Much of his recent research has been focused on Lithium, both its extraction and isotopic separation, as well as its applications beyond batteries, especially within nuclear technologies.  Our interdialogue spanned a range of topics, though focused a good amount on the complex environmental, economic and geopolitical landscape around the lithium supply chain, and how lithium has tremendous added value within present and future nuclear technologies. 00:00 Argentina’s Nuclear Energy and Technology Development 02:00 The Status of Nuclear Power Reactors in Argentina 06:10 The Development of Small Modular Reactors in Argentina 09:24 Preserving Argentina’s Lithium Reserves for Nuclear Technologies 45:43 Beyond Batteries: Lithium-6 and Lithium-7 in Nuclear Technologies 47:05 Separation and Enrichment Methods for Producing Lithium-6 and Lithium-7 01:16:10 Geopolitics and Policy Decisions in Lithium Research