Sune Lehmann

Studying the hidden patterns of social systems through networks, data, and complexity science.

Professor of Networks & Complexity Science — DTU Compute Professor of Social Data Science — University of Copenhagen
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AboutResearch & Perspective

My work focuses on developing a quantitative understanding of social systems based on massive datasets. Trained as a physicist, I use methods from complex systems, machine learning, and statistics to make sense of human behavior at scale.

With Laura Alessandretti, I direct the Social Complexity Lab, where we study everything from how people move through cities to how information spreads through networks.

I am a member of the Danish Royal Academy of Sciences and Letters. During the COVID-19 pandemic, I served on a Danish government task force modeling disease spread, and contributed to the development of the national contact tracing app.

I have published 112 papers, including work in Nature, Nature Physics, Science Advances, PNAS, and Nature Human Behaviour.

ResearchAreas of Focus

Complex Networks

Community detection, temporal networks, and the structure of large-scale social systems.

Human Mobility

How people move through cities and across borders, and what mobility patterns reveal about society.

Computational Social Science

Applying physics and machine learning to understand behavior, sleep, academic performance, and health.

Information Spreading

How ideas, news, and misinformation propagate through social media and communication networks.

Epidemic Modeling

Modeling disease transmission dynamics using network science and large-scale behavioral data.

Social Media Dynamics

Quantitative analysis of online behavior, platform effects, and digital social systems.

InteractiveA Small Network

Networks are at the heart of my research. Drag the nodes below to explore a force-directed graph — a model of how connected systems self-organize.

Drag nodes to interact

TeachingCourses at DTU

I teach courses on social data analysis and network science. Materials are open on GitHub.

  • Social Data Analysis and Visualization 02806 · DTU
  • Social Graphs and Interactions 02805 · DTU

BackgroundPath

Current
Professor, DTU Compute & SODAS, University of Copenhagen
Technical University of Denmark · Copenhagen
Postdoc
Postdoctoral Fellow
Institute for Quantitative Social Science · Harvard University
Postdoc
Postdoctoral Fellow & Researcher
Center for Complex Network Research · Northeastern University
Ph.D. 2007
Complex Networks
Technical University of Denmark
M.Sc. 2003
Physics
Niels Bohr Institute · University of Copenhagen
B.Sc. 2001
Physics
Niels Bohr Institute · University of Copenhagen