World-renownedPhysicist Receives Prestigious Honor for Exemplary Contributions to Interdisciplinary Science

Boston, Mass. – Northeastern University physicist Albert-László Barabási has been elected into the Academia Europaea by members of the prestigious organization. Barabási is now a Foreign Member of the Academia, as he does not reside in Europe, and is one of four elected members in the Physics category in 2007.

“I am honored to be recognized among Europe’s leading scholars,” said Barabási, Distinguished Professor of Physics at Northeastern University. “It is especially unique for me, as a U.S.-based scientist to have my work and scientific contributions acknowledged by such a prestigious community of another continent.”

Membership into the Academia is by invitation only, following a peer review selection process. The primary criterion for membership is sustained academic excellence in the candidate’s field. Barabási is a pioneer in networking as a unified scientific theory and has examined network patterns in all aspects of life, from the worldwide spread of AIDS to social relationships, obesity, the World Wide Web and cellular systems. His work has been published regularly in highly prestigious scientific journals and he is the author of “Linked: The New Science of Networks.”

Foreign Members of the Academia have presented clear evidence of a strong and sustained collaboration and working links with European institutions and centers of scholarship, as well as honors by European institutions and periods of residence at European centers.Barabási, a Hungarian national is also an External Member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.

The Academia Europaea is a non-governmental association dedicated to education and research that serves as a “European Academy of Sciences.” Founded in 1988, the organization’s more than 2,000 members include scientists and scholars from 35 European and eight non-European nations. Members include experts from the physical sciences and technology, biological sciences and medicine, mathematics, the letters and humanities, social and cognitive sciences, economics and law.

Barabási holds degrees from the University of Bucharest, Romania in Physics and Engineering, and the Eötvös Lóránd University in Budapest, Hungary in Physics. He received his Ph.D. from Boston University in Physics.

For more information on Dr. Barabási’s research, please contact Renáta Nyúl at 617-373-7424 or at r.nyul@neu.edu.

About Northeastern

Founded in 1898, Northeastern University is a private research university located in the heart of Boston. Northeastern is a leader in interdisciplinary research, urban engagement, and the integration of classroom learning with real-world experience. The university’s distinctive cooperative education program, where students alternate semesters of full-time study with semesters of paid work in fields relevant to their professional interests and major, is one of the largest and most innovative in the world. The University offers a comprehensive range of undergraduate and graduate programs leading to degrees through the doctorate in six undergraduate colleges, eight graduate schools, and two part-time divisions. For more information, please visit www.northeastern.edu.