Federico Botta

NOTE: I finished my PhD in November 2016, and have moved on to a new research position. This webapge will not be updated anymore.

For an updated version, please visit my personal webpage!

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I am a PhD student in the Centre for Complexity Science, University of Warwick.

My project focuses on the community structure of complex networks. As an illustrative example, the figure below presents the Friendship network of my Facebook profile page (i.e. how my friends on Facebook are connected with each other). Every circle represents one person and two circles are connected if these two people are friends (in the Facebook world):

Friendship Network of my Facebook page

You can immediately notice the presence of different groups of people (or nodes, in the network language) which share many friendships (or connections) with each other, but less with people from other groups. For example, the people in the group colored in orange on the left are almost all friends with each other, but they only share two/three connections with the group at the top. Each one of these groups is called a 'community'. Being able to find these communities in a more general situation is of fundamental importance for applications. The spreading of epidemics in a population depends heavily on how the interactions between people are, proteins interact with other groups of proteins in specific ways and identifying these groups can lead to a deeper understanding of how a disease affects the biological interactions, banks in the financial sector borrow and lend money in a complex way and knowing which banks are dealing with each other the most might help prevent financial crisis and shocks, and so on.

All these problems can be studied within the same framework (with appropriate definitions) and, therefore, the study of communities is fundamental in the context of network theory.

I am interested in algorithms and techniques to detect communities, in processes happening on networks with a community structure and also in gaining a deeper understanding of the community structure in real-world data sets.

I am being supervised by Dr. Charo I Del Genio (Mathematics Institute and Centre for Complexity Science, University of Warwick).

I also work on some projects under the supervision of Dr. Tobias Preis (Warwick Business School, University of Warwick) and Dr. Suzy Moat (Warwick Business School, University of Warwick).

Areas of Interest:

Community definition and detection in complex networks, structure of real-world networks, statistical mechanics, connections between statistical physics and networks, big data, computational social sciences, data science, mathematical modelling of real-world systems

For a complete academic CV see CV_Federico_Botta

Short Academic CV:

MSc degree in Complexity Science awarded with Distinction in 2013;
MSc degree in Theoretical Physics with a thesis on "Non-Relativistic Vacua in String Theory" (for a summary see summary_non_relativistic_vacua_in_string_theory.pdf), awarded by "Universita' degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca" (www.unimib.it), in 2012 with final degree 109/110;
BSc degree in physics with a thesis on "Path Integrals in Quantum Mechanics: Theory and Applications" (for a summary see path_integrals_in_quantum_mechanics.pdf), awarded by "Universita' degli Studi di Milano-Bicocca" (www.unimib.it), in 2009 with final degree of 108/110;

Teaching Experience:

Big Data Analytics, MSc in Finance, Warwick Business School, 2013/2014 & 2014-2015
Big Data Analytics, MSc in Business, Warwick Business School, 2014-2015
Advanced Data Analysis, MSc in Management Science and Operational Research, Warwick Business School, 2013/2014 & 2014-2015
Quantitative Analysis for Management I, BSc in Management/International Management, Warwick Business School, 2014-2015
Quantitative Analysis for Management II, BSc in Management/International Management, Warwick Business School, 2013/2014 & 2014-2015 (click here for a visualisation of the feedback from students in 2014-2015)
Quantitative Methods for Multivariate Analysis, Bsc in Management/International Management, Warwick Business School, 2013/2014 & 2014-2015
Big Data Analytics, MBA in Behavioural Sciences for the Manager, Warwick Business School, one day course in May 2014

12 weeks miniprojects (MSc in Complexity Science):

Miniproject 1: "Quantifying Return Distributions in Financial Markets Using High Frequency Data", Supervised by Dr. Tobias Preis, Warwick Business School, and Prof. Eugene Stanley, Center for Polymer Studies and Department of Physics, Boston University.

Miniproject 2: "Completion of sub-projects in complex engineering projects", supervised by Prof. Paul Davies, Loughborough University, Dr. Colm Connaughton, Warwick Mathematics Institute and Centre for Complexity Science, and Dr. Thomas House, Warwick Mathematics Institute and Centre for Complexity Science.

Various:

In the academic year 2013-2014 I have been nominated as a commendee in the Warwick Award for Teaching Excellence for PostGraduate Research students (WATEPGR).
I am also enrolled for the Postgraduate Certificate in Transferrable Skills, developping skills such as team building, teaching in higher education and doctoral skills.
I am one of the editors of the Centre for Complexity Science Newsletter
You can find here a list of conferences and summer schools that I attended

For information you can contact me at:

f.botta@warwick.ac.uk
fede_3x@hotmail.it

Follow me on Twitter:

@Fede_Botta

Or come and find me in:

D2.05 Centre for Complexity Science, Zeeman Building, University of Warwick, CV4 7AL