Collective dynamics in science and society

Abstract

This editorial paper presents the articles published in a special issue devoted to active particle methods applied to modeling, qualitative analysis, and simulation of the collective dynamics of large systems of interacting living entities in science and society. The modeling approach refers to the mathematical tools of behavioral swarms theory and to the kinetic theory of active particles. Applications focus on classical problems of swarms theory, on crowd dynamics related to virus contagion problems, and to multiscale problems related to the derivation of models at a large scale from the mathematical description at the microscopic scale. A critical analysis of the overall contents of the issue is proposed, with the aim to provide a forward look to research perspectives.