Title Promoter Affiliations Abstract "Social Media as Political Network: A Social Network Analysis Approach to Immigration Debates on Twitter" "Leen d'Haenens" "Institute for Media Studies" "This research aims to investigate the dynamics of political communication in online social networks. Social media constitutes an integral part of the spread of information in contemporary societies. Consequently, digital social platforms are crucial for political parties and movements to spread their message. Gaining insights into these social networks is crucial because, on the one hand, they have the potential to boost political efficacy and participation; on the other hand, they may create echo chambers and polarising outcomes and are instrumental in the spread of disinformation or conspiracy theories. Accordingly, the consequences of these technologies are significant due to their impact on the future of democracies. In short, the goal of this project has significant implications for academic research, governmental policy formation, and public debates. The central research case will be based on the H2020 OPPORTUNITIES project Twitter data on immigration debates. A social network analysis (SNA) method will be applied to the support networks of political leaders and parties in four different countries: Italy, Germany, Austria, and Hungary. The extensive tweet data will be used to model the networks in Gephi based on a number of criteria (such as follows, retweets, replies) and variables (such as ideological orientation, national context, hashtags) in order to disclose the patterns and disparities. Moreover, a variety of network analysis algorithms will be applied to identify the forms, clusters (communities), key nodes, and other network metrics. Subsequently, it is planned to extend the research by 1) applying sentiment analysis to the tweet data, 2) incorporating other platforms into SNA for comparison, 3) focusing further on various political conditions (liberal vs. authoritarian) to investigate their effects, and 4) studying other controversial online political debates to detect any affinities." "Enhancing the innovativeness of food SMEs through the management of strategic networdk behavior and network learning performance" "NETGROW is a collabrative project in the European 7th Framework Programme. The project consists of two main approaches to investigate how innovation in SMEs can be increased through enhanced network learning: 1) the focal company approach: investigating the attitudes and preferences of food SMEs towards networking and 2) the network approach: exploring how the functioning of networks effects innovation." "NIKAW: Tracing the Impact of Change on Citation Networks in Ancient Literary Texts: a Social Network Analysis-Based Approach" "Margherita Fantoli" "Department of Management, Strategy and Innovation (main work address Leuven), Ancient History, Leuven, Cultural Studies Research Group" "This thesis is part of the interdisciplinary NIKAW-project (Networks of Ideas and Knowledge in the Ancient World), which aims to use state of the art digital methods such as Natural Language Processing (NLP) and Social Network Analysis (SNA) to analyse the circulation of knowledge in Ancient Greek and Latin literary texts. The goal is to capture how historical and cultural changes impacted the network of citations in these texts with deep, long-lasting shifts. The first part of my contribution will focus specifically on the creation of a graph database containing mentions in these texts with as goal identifying and developing strategies for information modelling for mentions. I will populate a graph database with all mentions retrieved automatically linked to historical people. In the second part, I will analyse the citation network’s evolution with a focus on the question of how we can model the circulation of knowledge as a flow reacting to historical events. Using SNA methods, I will attempt to get a picture of the evolution of the citation network and to detect actors with similar roles in the transmission of knowledge. To provide a concrete test case, I will focus on the advent of Christianity in the period from the first to the fourth century CE. In order to see how the citation network changes as a result of cultural shock, I will focus on changes in the network after the publication of the systematizing work the Diuinae Institutiones by Lactantius (an example of endogenous shock) and after the 313 Edict of Milan (an exogenous shock)." "Assessing the effects of habitat fragmentation on plant pollinator networks in dune slacks using metabarcoding and linking the network structures with plant fitness" "Hans Jacquemyn" "Ecology, Evolution and Biodiversity Conservation" "A classic prediction of co-evolutionary theory is that mutualists should restrict their associations to a limited number of high-quality partners in order for the interaction to remain stable. However, in practice most mutualists either simultaneously or sequentially associate with multiple partners that confer the same reward. One of the best-known mutualisms is between plants and animal pollinators. In this mutualism, generalist plants that have multiple pollinators are expected to have a fitness advantage compared to specialist plants that have few pollinators due to different processes (e.g. sampling effects, portfolio effects, complementarity). Yet, fitness costs in generalists may arise by associating with multiple pollinators, for example as a result of pollen (and ovule) discounting or stigma clogging (or improper pollen transfer). Moreover, these effects can be expected to depend on the availability and abundance of the various partners, which are likely to vary across populations within the landscape and therefore to affect interactions between partners (network structure) and plant fitness. How partner availability shapes network structure and plant fitness remains poorly understood. The major aim of this study is to investigate the relationship between partner diversity, network structure and individual plant fitness in coastal dune slacks. We will take advantage of the highly fragmented dune area along the Belgian coast, where both plant and insect diversity and abundance depend on the size and isolation of dune slack patches. We predict that, due to a limited number of pollinators, plant-pollinator networks will develop into more generalist systems in the more fragmented dune slacks, yet that this results in decreased plant fitness. We further predict that plants with specialized pollination systems will suffer larger fitness costs than generalist plants and therefore are more susceptible to fragmentation than generalist plants. To test these predictions, we will construct and analyze plant-pollinator networks using a novel meta-barcoding approach across a range of fragmented dune slacks varying in size and spatial isolation and will assess the effects of network structure and niche breadth on pollen deposition (contribution of conspecific and heterospecific pollen) and fitness (seed set and quality) in both specialist and generalist plant species. Ultimately, the results of this project will contribute to a better understanding of the unique biodiversity of coastal dune slacks which, due to human modification of the environment, are in decline in Europe." "A network of networks to progress urban climate science" "Herwig Dejonghe" "Department of Physics and astronomy" "Urban landscapes interact via complex physical processes with the atmosphere resulting in a so-called urban climate1. A well-known illustration is the urban heat island effect which describes the increased temperatures in urban landscapes with respect to the rural surroundings. This phenomenon leads to additional heat stress in cities2 and impacts power consumption3, air pollution4, ecology5, etc. Cities are densely populated economic hubs and therefore very vulnerable to weather extremes. Projected urbanization and climate change indicate the risks in urban areas will increase6. Improved urban climate understanding is therefore crucial to permit decision makers to make our cities resilient. High-accuracy meteorological observations in cities are essential for urban climate science7. Given the substantial investments needed for the installation and maintenance, only a limited number of long-term monitoring networks is operational over the world. These networks often measure different variables, use different data formats and are maintained by different institutes, which explains why today’s urban climate research is typically limited to case studies in single cities8-11. Urban climate science would strongly benefit from collaboration among the different research institutes operating urban climate networks. First, such a network of networks would permit to share experiences on technology (e.g. sensors, communication, energy), the selection of measurement locations, the interaction with local stakeholders (e.g. policy maker), etc. This would allow to learn from the successes and failures of others thereby improving the quality and durability of existing and future urban monitoring networks. Secondly, by gathering the operational observation networks in European cities this proposal facilitates going beyond single city studies towards more systematic urban climate studies. The collaboration creates the possibility to investigate the urban climate impact, to validate highresolution urban models and to study the interaction between urbanization and climate change, in different cities of varying sizes over all European climatic zones. Thirdly, the network creates a forum for European urban climate groups facilitating future joint research, projects and publications. Via the organization of (virtual) meetings, a symposium and scientific visits the scientific research network will initiate European collaboration, motivate the exchange of data, work out standardized observational practices and stimulate joint research. Ultimately the initiative intends to strengthen the urban climate research by gathering the main European research groups active in urban climate monitoring. The projected outcome over 5 years consists of joint publications, research initiatives and project proposals at a European level. Given its strong recent rise in the establishment of urban observations, modelling and impact studies, Flanders is in an excellent position to address the urgent need to initiate such a European network. The proposal gathers 10 research institutes collecting urban meteorological data including the most prominent European urban climate networks and scientists. From the Flemish side, researchers from UGent, KULeuven, RMI and VITO active on urban climate networks, modelling or impact studies are included. Backed by their expertise of installing the MOCCA network, the first long term meteorological network in a Belgian city, and the recently approved VLINDER citizen science project, which will monitor the microclimate at 50 locations in Flanders and Brussels, Atmospheric Physics group (UGent) will coordinate the scientific research network.   References: (1) Oke, T. (1982) QJRMS. 108, 1-24. (2) Conti, S. et al. (2005) Env. Res. 98, 390-399. (3) Santamouris, M. (2014) Energ. Build. 82, 100-113. (4) Sarrat, C. et al. (2006) Atm. Env. 40, 1743-1758. (5) Merckx T., et al. (2018) Nature. 558, 113-116. (6) Bader, D.A. et al. (2018) ARC3.2 report. (7) Muller, C. (2013) IJOC. 33, 1585-1600. (8) Heaviside, C. et al. (2016) Env. Health. 15, 49-59. (9) Steeneveld, G.J. et al. (2011) JGRA. 116, 1-14. (10) Suomi, J. et al. (2012) 32, 451-463. (11) Chow, W. et al. (2006) 26, 2243-2260" "AI-based wireless access network design for future (B)5G networks under energy- and EMF-constraints" "Wout Joseph" "Department of Information technology" "In the last decades, not only an increase in mobile devices has been noticed, but these devices are also becoming very powerful, allowing more demanding services such as data streaming or video calling. In the future, wireless access networks need to expand to cope with these extra demands to keep the user satisfied. However, network planning is currently already a very complex problem due to the many targets such as cost, performance, etc. To meet the requirements of the next-generation networks, network should be taken to the next level. Future network design should be EMF- (Electromagnetic Field) and energy-aware, but also have a high degree of flexibility. 5G for example will use a variety of technologies in a single network such as beam forming, mmWave frequencies and Massive MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) requiring advanced machine learning techniques to deal with this network complexity and ensure the energy- and EMF-awareness. For energy-awareness, one should also look at using renewable energy sources to feed the wireless access network instead of using fossil fuels like today. Finally, to allow a high degree of network flexibility, one should use mobile base stations. This can be done by UAV (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle) aided networks. In this type of networks, mobile stations are mounted on UAVs or drones to provide additional performance on a more local scale. Each of the above requirements will be addressed in this research proposal." "CO-CREATION NETWORKS AS ENABLERS OF INNOVATION: Uncovering the Interplay Between Network Structure and Collaboration Process" "Trui Steen" "Public Governance Institute" "Co-creation networks involve the collaboration between public and private actors to deliver innovative solutions. They are an important governance tool to cope with complex issues that governments cannot solve alone, such as climate change, the Covid-19 pandemic or poverty. However, while academics and practitioners treat cocreation as a panacea, there are still gaps in understanding cocreation networks and, more specifically, how they can achieve innovative solutions. This project will contribute to filling these gaps by asking under which conditions co-creation networks lead to innovation, with a focus on network structures and collaboration processes. To address this research question, the project will combine insights from network literature and co-creation studies to foster theoretical thinking. Next, it will examine six Living Labs as they are multi-actor networks that aim to foster innovation through co-creation in real-life settings. The research project will follow a three-phase empirical study combining (1) Social Network Analysis, (2) in-depth comparative case studies, and (3) Qualitative Comparative Analysis. Through this multi-method approach, this project will provide a detailed understanding of the various conditions related to co-creation networks and will determine how these conditions interact to foster innovation. By bringing together cocreation and network research, this project will move forward their theoretical and empirical agenda." "Networks of volunteers and paid staff: A mixed method analysis on network positions, structure and effectiveness." "Peter Raeymaeckers" "Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Centre for Research on Environmental and Social Change" "Public and nonprofit organizations are increasingly relying on social networks of volunteers and paid staff for social service delivery. Against this background, we rely on social network analysis to advance theoretical and practical knowledge on (1) the structure of networks and positions in networks of volunteers and paid staff in public and nonprofit organizations, and (2) how volunteers and paid staff use their social networks to reach more effective social services. Our two theoretical objectives focus on (1) development and validation of detailed theoretical propositions about the networks between individuals that collaborate in the roles of volunteers and paid staff and (2) creation of a deeper theoretical understanding of the managerial and policy actions that decision-makers can apply in order to improve social service networks. These objectives are further elaborated in six concrete research questions, which are the foci of the work packages in our planned approach. Our project has a strong empirical component. Given the nature of the research questions, we will apply quantitative and qualitative research methods, including interviews, network analysis, Q-sorting interviews, and conjoint experiments. The planned research will contribute – through the interdisciplinary collaboration of the applicants – to the literature on social networks, social work, and volunteer management." "Networks of volunteers and paid staff: A mixed method analysis on network positions, structure and effectiveness" "Sarah Dury" "Educational Science, Society and Ageing Research Lab, Sustainable chemicals production research cluster: Separation Technology & Economics and Policy making" "Public and nonprofit organizations are increasingly relying on social networks of volunteers and paid staff for social service delivery. Against this background, we rely on social network analysis to advance theoretical and practical knowledge on (1) the structure of networks and positions in networks of volunteers and paid staff in public and nonprofit organizations, and (2) how volunteers and paid staff use their social networks to reach more effective social services. Our two theoretical objectives focus on (1) development and validation of detailed theoretical propositions about the networks between individuals that collaborate in the roles of volunteers and paid staff and (2) creation of a deeper theoretical understanding of the managerial and policy actions that decision-makers can apply in order to improve social service networks. These objectives are further elaborated in six concrete research questions, which are the foci of the work packages in our planned approach. Our project has a strong empirical component. Given the nature of the research questions, we will apply quantitative and qualitative research methods, including interviews, network analysis, Q-sorting interviews, and conjoint experiments. The planned research will contribute – through the interdisciplinary collaboration of the applicants – to the literature on social networks, social work, and volunteer management." "Networks of professionals and informal caregivers: a social network analysis." "Peter Raeymaeckers" "Centre for Research on Environmental and Social Change" "Public service organizations are increasingly using networks of volunteers and professionals to support, guide and provide services to vulnerable groups. Against this background, this study (1) analyzes the structure of networks and positions in networks of volunteers and professionals public service organizations, and (2) analyzes how professionals, volunteers, and patients evaluate these networks. This research develops and validates theoretical assumptions about networks between individuals working together in the roles of volunteers and paid staff. Our project has a strong empirical component. Given the nature of the research questions, we will combine quantitative and qualitative research methods, including interviews, network analysis and evaluation research. The planned research will contribute to the literature on social networks, social work, and volunteer management."