Dashun Wang is a professor of Management and Organizations at the Kellogg School of Management. He serves as the founding director of the Center for Science of Science and Innovation (CSSI)^[2] and a founding co-director of the Ryan Institute on Complexity.^[3][4][5] Wang is a recipient of the AFOSR Young Investigator award (2016)^[6] and was named one of Poets & Quants Best 40 Under 40 Professors (2019).^[7]

Career

In 2007, Wang earned an undergraduate degree in physics from Fudan University, Shanghai, China. He then earned both a M.Sc. and a PhD in physics from Northeastern University. From January 2015 to July 2016, he was an assistant professor of College of Information Sciences and Technology at Pennsylvania State University, University Park. He is currently a professor of Management and Organizations at the Kellogg School of Management and the McCormick School of Engineering, at Northwestern University.^[8]

Research

Wang studies the science of science, an interdisciplinary field that examines scientific careers and the scientific process. His work on the career paths of individual innovators identifies patterns in scientific careers, including the random impact rule and the hot streak phenomenon.^[9][10]

His study of the organization of innovative activity shows that bigger teams generally advance and improve established concepts, and smaller teams are more often responsible for breakthroughs in science and technology.^[11][12]

Wang's research on failure has led to empirical evidence of the importance of responses to failure at the beginning of careers^[13][14] and a quantitative framework for learning from failure. He has also studied collective dynamics in social networks, human mobility, and long-term scientific impact.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Wang analyzed global policy responses to the pandemic.^[15]

Awards and honors

In 2014, Wang received the Invention Achievement Award from IBM Research. In 2016, Wang was a recipient of the AFOSR Young Investigator award.^[6] In 2018, he received an award from the Minerva Research Initiative, a research program sponsored by the U.S. Department of Defense.^[16][2] In 2019, his paper about the impact of the size of scientific teams was one of Altmetric’s Top 100 most discussed papers across all sciences,^[17] and he was named one of Poets & Quants Best 40 Under 40 Professors.^[7] In 2021, he was awarded the Erdős–Rényi Prize.^[18]

Selected publications

References