Raissa D'Souza

When D'Souza was younger she faced the personal choice of going to college or moving to Paris to become a fashion designer.{{Cite web|url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voXq3WlJQVc|title=One of a kind, UC Davis|website=YouTube|date=27 October 2015 }} She eventually settled on university and studied physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign.{{Cite web|url=http://physics.ucdavis.edu/people/faculty/raissa-dsouza|title=Department of Physics :: Raissa D'Souza|website=physics.ucdavis.edu|access-date=2019-09-07}} She earned her doctoral degree in theoretical physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1999, where she worked with Mehran Kardar and Norman Margolus. After graduation, she worked in both the fundamental mathematics group at Bell Labs and the Theory group at Microsoft Research. She held a visiting research position at the École Normale Supérior and the California Institute of Technology.

D'Souza was appointed as an Assistant Professor to the University of California, Davis in 2005, promoted to Associate Professor in 2008, and to Full Professor in 2013. She works on the mathematics of networks and the dynamics of how processes unfold on networks.{{Citation|title=Raissa D'Souza - "The Science of Networks" (C4 Public Lectures)| date=29 April 2019 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6U7ksiu10Y|language=en|access-date=2019-09-07}} These networks could be in technological, biological or social systems. She has studied the interaction between nodes, and how these can lead to self-organizing behaviour. She demonstrated that there exists a percolation threshold, where at a certain point a small number of additional connections can result in a considerable fraction of the network becoming connected.{{Cite journal|last1=Spencer|first1=Joel|last2=D'Souza|first2=Raissa M.|last3=Achlioptas|first3=Dimitris|date=2009-03-13|title=Explosive Percolation in Random Networks|journal=Science|language=en|volume=323|issue=5920|pages=1453–1455|doi=10.1126/science.1167782|issn=0036-8075|pmid=19286548|bibcode=2009Sci...323.1453A|s2cid=54565131}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-complex-networks-explode-with-growth-20150714/|title=How Complex Networks Explode with Growth|website=Quanta Magazine|date=14 July 2015|access-date=2019-09-07}} The percolation transition can be applied to a variety of real-world systems, from nanotubes to epileptic seizures or social networks.{{Cite web|url=https://engineering.ucdavis.edu/blog/raissa-dsouza-earns-cover-story-prestigious-journal/|title=Raissa D'Souza Earns Cover Story in Physics Journal|date=2015-07-16|website=College of Engineering UC Davis|language=en-US|access-date=2019-09-07}} Large-scale connectivity and synchronisation can be crucial to the structure and function of complex networks.{{Cite journal|last1=D'Souza|first1=Raissa M.|last2=Gómez-Gardeñes|first2=Jesus|last3=Nagler|first3=Jan|last4=Arenas|first4=Alex|date=2019-07-03|title=Explosive phenomena in complex networks|journal=Advances in Physics|volume=68|issue=3|pages=123–223|doi=10.1080/00018732.2019.1650450|issn=0001-8732|arxiv=1907.09957|bibcode=2019AdPhy..68..123D|s2cid=198179863}} She demonstrated that sparse connections between separate networks helps to suppress cascading failures.{{Cite journal|title=Suppressing cascades of load in interdependent networks|date=2012| last1=Brummitt|first1=Charles | last2=D'Souza|first2=Raissa|last3=Leicht|first3=Elizabeth|journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences|volume=109|issue=12|pages=E680–E689|doi=10.1073/pnas.1110586109|pmid=22355144|pmc=3311366|arxiv=1106.4499|doi-access=free}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.quantamagazine.org/math-models-seek-to-prevent-network-failures-20130318/|title=Math Models Seek to Prevent Network Failures|website=Quanta Magazine|date=18 March 2013|access-date=2019-09-07}} She has also studied cascading behaviours in general, including power-grid failures, crashes in financial markets and spreads of political movements.{{Cite journal|last=D'Souza|first=Raissa M.|date=2017-11-17|title=Curtailing cascading failures|journal=Science|language=en|volume=358|issue=6365|pages=860–861|doi=10.1126/science.aaq0474|issn=0036-8075|pmid=29146792|bibcode=2017Sci...358..860D|s2cid=206665017}}

In 2014 D'Souza was awarded a United States Department of Defense Multidisciplinary University Research Initiative Award to investigate the prediction and control of interdependent networks for the period 2014–2019.{{Cite web|url=http://mae.engr.ucdavis.edu/dsouza/controlMURI.html|title=Controlling Collective Phenomena in Complex Networks|website=mae.engr.ucdavis.edu|access-date=2019-09-07}}

File:Raissa D'Souza at Conference on Complex Systems 2017.jpg

She is an External Professor at both the Santa Fe Institute and the Complexity Science Hub Vienna. She was a Kavli Fellow of the National Academy of Sciences several times and previously served on the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council of Complex Systems.{{Cite web|url=https://cns-nrt.indiana.edu/the-program/advisory-board/Raissa-DSouza.html|title=Raissa D'Souza: Advisory Board: The Program: Interdisciplinary Training in Complex Networks and Systems: Indiana University Bloomington|website=Interdisciplinary Training in Complex Networks and Systems|language=en-US|access-date=2019-09-07}} She was made an inaugural member of the Global Young Academy in 2010.{{Cite web|url=https://globalyoungacademy.net/rmdsouza/docs/|title=Raissa M. D'Souza's Profile {{!}}|website=Global Young Academy|language=en-US|access-date=2019-09-07}} In 2015, D'Souza was appointed the 2nd President of the Network Science Society, and served in this role until 2018.

In 2019, she was awarded the Network Science Society's inaugural Euler Award "for her influential contribution to the discovery and study of explosive percolation and the insights it provided to explosive synchronization and network optimization".{{Cite web|url=https://netscisociety.net/award-prizes/euler-award|title=Euler Award|website=Network Society|access-date=2019-09-07}}

D'Souza serves on the Scientific Advisory Board of Quanta Magazine. She was made lead editor of the American Physical Society journal Physical Review Research in 2019.{{cite web|url=https://journals.aps.org/prresearch/edannounce/raissa-dsouza-appointed-lead-editor-of-physical-review-research|website=journals.aps.org|title=Raissa d'Souza appointed lead editor|date=26 June 2019}} Since Aug 2020, she is a member of the Board of Reviewing Editors at Science.

Her awards and honours include;

• 2015 Elected President of the Network Science Society
• 2016 Elected Fellow of the American Physical Society{{Cite web|url=https://www.aps.org/programs/honors/fellowships/archive-all.cfm|title=APS Fellow Archive|website=www.aps.org|language=en|access-date=2019-09-07}}
• 2017 University of California, Davis Outstanding Mid-Career Faculty Research Award{{Cite web|url=https://engineering.ucdavis.edu/awards-and-honors/outstanding-mid-career-faculty-research-award/|title=Outstanding Mid-Career Faculty Research Award|website=College of Engineering UC Davis|language=en-US|access-date=2019-09-07}}
• 2018 ACM Test-of-Time award (for lasting influence of paper from 2008{{Cite book|chapter-url=https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/1453101.1453107|title=Proceedings of the 16th ACM SIGSOFT International Symposium on Foundations of software engineering|date=2008|volume=ACM|pages=24–35|doi=10.1145/1453101.1453107|s2cid=5839120 |chapter=Latent social structure in open source projects |last1=Bird |first1=Christian |last2=Pattison |first2=David |last3=d'Souza |first3=Raissa |last4=Filkov |first4=Vladimir |last5=Devanbu |first5=Premkumar |isbn=978-1-59593-995-1 }})
• 2019 Network Science Society Euler Award{{Cite web|url=https://mae.ucdavis.edu/news/raissa-dsouza-receives-two-honors-network-science-society|title=Raissa D'Souza receives two honors from the Network Science Society|last=Pflueger-Peters|first=Noah A.|website=mae.ucdavis.edu|language=en|access-date=2019-09-07|date=2019-06-18}}
• 2019 Elected Fellow of the Network Science Society{{Cite web|url=https://netscisociety.net/award-prizes/society-fellows|title=Society Fellows|last=D'Souza|first=Raissa|website=Network Society|access-date=2019-09-07}}
• 2022 Outstanding Service Award of the Network Science Society{{Cite web|url=https://netscisociety.net/award-prizes/service-award|title=Service Award|last=D'Souza|first=Raissa|website=Network Society|access-date=2022-08-08}}

Her publications include;

• {{Cite journal|url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00018732.2019.1650450|date=2019|title=(2019) Explosive phenomena in complex networks|journal=Advances in Physics|volume=68|issue=3|pages=123–223|doi=10.1080/00018732.2019.1650450|arxiv=1907.09957|last1=D'Souza|first1=Raissa M.|last2=Gómez-Gardeñes|first2=Jesus|last3=Nagler|first3=Jan|last4=Arenas|first4=Alex|bibcode=2019AdPhy..68..123D |s2cid=198179863}}
• {{Cite journal|url=https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.1167782|title=(2009) Explosive percolation in random networks|date=2009|journal=Science|volume=323|issue=5920|pages=1453–1455|bibcode=2009Sci...323.1453A|doi=10.1126/science.1167782|pmid=19286548|last1=Achlioptas|first1=D.|last2=d'Souza|first2=R. M.|last3=Spencer|first3=J.|s2cid=54565131}}
• {{Cite journal|url=https://www.pnas.org/content/109/12/E680.short|title=(2012) Suppressing cascades of load in interdependent networks|date=2012|journal=Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences|volume=109|pages=E680–E689}}
• {{Cite book|chapter-url=https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/1453101.1453107|date=2008|series=Sigsoft '08/Fse-16|pages=24–35|doi=10.1145/1453101.1453107|isbn=9781595939951|s2cid=5839120 |chapter=Latent social structure in open source projects |title=Proceedings of the 16th ACM SIGSOFT International Symposium on Foundations of software engineering |last1=Bird |first1=Christian |last2=Pattison |first2=David |last3=d'Souza |first3=Raissa |last4=Filkov |first4=Vladimir |last5=Devanbu |first5=Premkumar }} Winner 2018 ACM Test-of-Time award.

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Category:American women computer scientists

Category:American computer scientists

Category:University of California, Davis faculty

Category:Fellows of the American Physical Society

Category:Living people

Category:1969 births

Category:American network scientists

Category:21st-century American scientists

Category:Massachusetts Institute of Technology alumni

Category:21st-century American women scientists