Andrea Scharnhorst

Head of Research at DANS
(Data Archiving and Networked Services)

Scientific Coordinator, Computational Humanities
e-Humanities Group
Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences

Dr. Andrea Scharnhorst is Head of Research at DANS and member of the e-humanities group at the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in Amsterdam. Her work focuses on modelling and simulating the emergence of innovations (new modes of behaviour and learning, forms of communication, technologies or scientific ideas) in social systems. She has worked on transfer of concepts and methods at an interface between physics and social sciences and humanities.

Dr. Scharnhorst has developed a specific framework (Geometrically Oriented Evolutionary THEories) to describe processes of problem solving and learning as an evolutionary search process in unknown knowledge landscapes. She has coordinated and participated in several EU- and national funded projects, such as “Web indicators for scientific, technological and innovation research”,”Competence and innovation in research networks – modeling self-organized learning of heterogeneous agents”, “Dissimilar simulation – the epistemics of simulation in the humanities” and “Critical Events in Evolving Networks”.

Currently, she coordinates the Computational Humanities Programme at the e-humanities group. She leads the working group “Information and Knowledge” of the COST action MP0801 “Physics of Competition and Conflicts”. Together with Andreas Pyka she edited a book on “Innovation networks” (2009), a special issue together with Katy Börner on “ Science of Science” in the Journal of Informetrics (2009), and another special issue on “Modeling science: studying the structure and dynamics of science” (together with Katy Börner, Wolfgang Glänzel and Peter van den Besselaar). Another book on “Models of Science Dynamics – Encounters Between Complexity Theory and Information Sciences (co-edited with Katy Börner and Peter van den Besselaar) will appear in 2011.

Main research interests

• Simulating innovation
• Innovation as simulation
• Models of self-organisation for complex systems
• Innovation dynamics and evolution of social systems
• Bibliometric analysis and evaluation
• “Landscape theories of social change”
- G_O_E_THE 
- Evolution of research technologies, in particular Web technologies
- Web based science, technology and innovation indicators.