PhD Concentration CASS

The Complex Adaptive Systems Science concentration, offered on ASU’s Tempe campus, is integrated with diverse university-wide research and emphasizes the value of a complex adaptive systems perspective when seeking solutions to critical societal issues. Complex adaptive systems science is the study of interactive and dynamic systems that learn and change over time.

Complex system behaviors are often said to be emergent and subject to self-organization, which makes them more difficult to predict. Such examples can include studying the long-term changes in epidemics, land degradation, urban growth, natural disasters and their impact. The concentration is open to students who have been accepted to doctoral programs in the School of Sustainability, the School of Human Evolution and Social Change, and the School of Life Sciences.

Students’ career opportunities will be enhanced by combining fluency in the common language of complexity with a solid foundation in the domain knowledge of existing academic disciplines. There is a growing need for scientists to be able to work and collaborate in an increasingly interdisciplinary context.

The Complex Adaptive Systems Science concentration is available in the following degree programs:

This interdisciplinary graduate program helps train the next generation of scientists in advanced concepts and methods needed for approaching diverse phenomena in the social and life sciences as complex adaptive systems. This educational program is tightly integrated with diverse, ongoing, university-wide research on CAS at Arizona State University and emphasizes the value of a CAS perspective to providing science with better insight and a more active role in seeking solutions to many critical issues facing our society today. 

Learning outcomes

Complex adaptive system science concepts and tools serve as a common language to promote interdisciplinary collaborations needed to address 21st-century intellectual and societal challenges. This concentration helps students become fluent in the common language of complexity while ensuring they receive a solid foundation in the domain knowledge of existing academic disciplines. The program embeds an understanding of CAS-relevant approaches in scientific research and discovery, not only to transform science, but to promote the development and testing of more robust theory and more sophisticated methods in a variety of research settings. The result is a deeper understanding of the nature and dynamics of CAS, grounded in concrete examples and applications rather than abstract theory.

Curriculum

A total of 15 credit hours are required to complete this program: 12 credit hours of coursework and 3 credit hours of dissertation.

Dissertation or research with CASS graduate faculty member (3 credit hours).

The chair or co-chair of the PhD supervisory committee must also be a member of the CASS graduate faculty.

Core courses (15 credits required)

  • Core course 3 credits
  • Mathematics for complex adaptive systems science 3 credits
  • Methods for complex adaptive systems science 3 credits
  • Applications of complex adaptive systems science 3 credits
  • Dissertation or research 3 credits

Required core course (3 credit hours)

  • CAS 570 (also cross-listed as ASM/BIO/SOS 570) Fundamentals of Complex Adaptive Systems Science

Choose one from the following mathematics of complexity courses (3 credit hours):

  • AML 591 Probability Theory 
  • AML 610 Topics in Applied Mathematics for the Life and Social Sciences
  • APM 598 Mathematical Methods for Complex Adaptive Systems
  • ASM 591 Dynamic Modeling in Social and Ecological Systems
  • CAS 522 Methods for Complex Systems Science: Dynamical Systems 
  • CAS 523 Methods for Complex Systems Science: Statistics and Dimensionality Reduction

Choose one from the following complexity methods courses (3 credit hours):

  • ABS 560 Ecological Modeling
  • AML 520 Agent Based Modeling
  • AML 591 Modeling in Game Theory
  • AML 612 Applied Mathematics for the Life and Social Sciences Modeling Seminar
  • ASM 591 Dynamic Modeling in Social and Ecological Systems
  • CSE 561 Modeling and Simulation Theory and Application
  • GIS 598 Local Statistical Modeling
  • PAF 591 Introduction to Policy Informatics
  • PUP 598 Modeling and Simulating Urban Environments
  • SOS 591 Agent-Based Modeling for Sustainability
  • SOS 591/AML 591/BIO 591 Ecological Modeling
  • CDE 598 Special Topics: Social Network Analysis
  • CAS 520 Methods for Complex Systems Science: Agent Based Modeling
  • CAS 521 Methods for Complex Systems Science: Network Analysis
  • CAS 522 Methods for Complex Systems Science: Dynamical Systems

Choose one course in applying CASS approaches (3 credit hours):

  • ANB 602 Current Issues in Animal Behavior
  • ASM 591/BIO591 Readings in Complexity
  • BIO 522 Populations: Evolutionary Ecology
  • BIO 545 Populations: Evolutionary Genetics
  • BIO 591 Topics in Mathematics for Life and Sustainability Science
  • GLG 495/598 Environmental Systems Biology
  • PAF 591 Complexity in Public Policy & Management
  • PAF 691 Social Dynamics and Policy Informatics
  • PSY 576 Dynamics in Psychology
  • PSY 598 Dynamics in Perception, Action and Cognition
  • SES 591 The Origins of Life
  • SES 598 Environmental Systems Biology
  • SES 598 Fundamentals of Complexity
  • SOS 591 Adaptation Resilience Transformation
  • SOS 591 Applied Robustness Analysis in Social-Ecological Systems
  • SOS 598 Social Network Analysis 
  • CAS 540 Complex Socio-Ecological Systems
  • CAS 541 Complex Urban Systems
  • CAS 542 Sustainability as a Problem of Complexity
  • CAS 543 Complexity Economics
  • CAS 544 Innovation in Complex Systems
  • CAS 545 Disease as a Complex System
  • CAS 546 Bio-Inspired AI and Optimization 
  • CAS 547 Sense-Making Complexity

For specific course descriptions, please visit ASU Catalog Search [First log on to My ASU].