Plamen Ch. Ivanov

Professor Ivanov, PhD, DSc, is Director of the Keck Laboratory for Network Physiology at Boston University, Associate Physiologist at the Division of Sleep Medicine, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Lecturer in Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He has introduced innovative ways of analyzing and modeling physiologic systems, adapting and developing concepts and methods from statistical physics and nonlinear dynamics. He has investigated the dynamics and control mechanisms of a range of physiological systems, including studies on cardiac and respiratory dynamics, sleep-stage transitions, circadian rhythms, locomotion and brain dynamics, and has uncovered basic laws of physiologic regulation. Dr. Ivanov has pioneered the study of dynamical network interactions of physiological organ systems, and has initiated Network Physiology as a new field of research. His current work focuses on forms of coupling and causality between dynamical systems, developing a theoretical framework to understand how physiologic states and functions emerge out of organ network interactions; how diverse organ systems coordinate and integrate their functions as a network to produce health or disease. His discoveries are featured in the media, including New Scientist, Nature Science Update, Nature Medicine: Research Highlights, Washington Post, Science News, Boston Globe, Physics World. He has served on the Editorial and Advisory Boards of nine scientific journals, including EPL (Europhysics Letters), Journal of Biological Physics, Frontiers in Fractal Physiology, New Journal of Physics. For his pioneering work at the interface of physics, physiology and biomedicine he was elected Fellow of the American Physical Society in 2010. He is recipient of the Sustained Research Excellence Award of the Biomedical Research Institute at Harvard Medical School, the Georgi Nadjakov Medal of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, the Pythagoras (Pitagor) Prize and the W. M. Keck Foundation Award.