Javier Borge-Holthoefer, Ramón y Cajal fellow and currently leading the Complex Systems group at the Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (IN3, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya), received a Ph.D. in Computer Science from the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (URV) in Tarragona (Spain) in 2011, preceded by a M.D. in Artificial Intelligence at the same university. Among other appointments, he taught at the Department of Computer Science and Mathematics and at the Department of Psychology (both in URV) in the period 2005-2010. Before joining the IN3, he was a member of the COSNET Lab and held a position as a post-doctoral fellow at the Institute for Biocomputation and Physics of Complex Systems (BIFI), University of Zaragoza in Spain (2011-2013). He then moved to the Middle East to work as a Scientist, at the Qatar Computing Research Institute (QCRI), Hamad bin Khalifa University (2014-2016). In the process, he has taken part in 6 research projects (3 as PI, 2 in Spanish projects, and 1 in a European FET- Open project).

Founded on Interdisciplinary Physics, his research has successfully explored a variety of topics, ranging from social networks, to urban systems, to mutualistic assemblages in Ecology. Far from blurring his trajectory, Dr. Borge-Holthoefer’s dedication to different fields has converged to the current synthesis efforts, e.g., mapping the ecological framework onto the context of online communication systems and urban settings. The strength of this interdisciplinary endeavor relies on a solid theoretical and methodological foundation, a long training period in Computer Science with a focus on numerical methods and data analytics, and an heterogeneous education in Humanities and Philosophy previous to the scientific career (B.D. in Philosophy, 2003; M.D. in Cognitive Science, 2007).

With more than 50 peer-reviewed works, his research has been published (among others) in Science Advances, Nature Communications, Social Networks, Communications Physics, Transportation Research C, Royal Society Interface, EPJ Data Science, Physical Review E, and Europhysics Letters. Dr. Borge-Holthoefer has also contributed two books and several chapters to the area of Computational Social Science, especially around the topics of coordination, collective action and information spreading on complex networks. Furthermore, his work has been disseminated both in Spain and abroad, with more than 40 oral talks and research seminars in national and international conferences (United States, Great Britain, Italy, Mexico, Finland, Singapore, etc.) and in first-class centers (including the Oxford Internet Institute, University of Cambridge, or the UNICEF headquarters in New York, among others). Last but not least, his research has reached out to the wider society through newspapers (eldiario.es, La Vanguardia, ABC), radio stations, and non-specialized scientific venues (e.g. PNAS Journal Club).
Committed to equal access opportunities in science, Dr. Borge-Holthoefer encourages the presence of young talented scientists in his research group, with attention to gender balance and geographic diversity among students and postdocs. Venezuela, Iran, Colombia or Italy — besides local researchers– are represented in the group.

Finally, Dr. Borge-Holthoefer’s activities include as well service to the scientific community, through the organization of events (conference and/or program committees in Statistical Physics and Computer Science events), serving at Editorial Boards (PNAS Nexus), and as a reviewer for some of the main multidisciplinary journals (Nature Communications, Science Advances, etc.) and several state science agencies.