We discuss the results of three recent phenomenological studies focussed on understanding the distinctive statistical properties of financial time series – (i) The probability distribution of stock price fluctuations: Stock price fluctuations occur in all magnitudes, in analogy to earthquakes...

This paper is a brief summary of a talk that was designed to address the question of whether two of the pillars of the field of phase transitions and critical phenomena – scale invariance and universality – can be useful in guiding research on a broad class of complex phenomena. We shall see...

In recent years, physicists have begun to apply concepts and methods of statistical physics to study economic problems, and the neologism “econophysics” is increasingly used to refer to this work. Much recent work is focused on understanding the statistical properties of time series. One...

It is common knowledge that any two firms in the economy are correlated. Even firms belonging to different sectors of an industry may be correlated because of “indirect” correlations. How can we analyze and understand these correlations? This article reviews recent results regarding...

In this paper we apply scaling laws from percolation theory to the problem of estimating the time for a fluid injected into an oil field (for the purposes of recovering the oil) to breakthrough into a production well. The main contribution is to show that percolation theory, when applied to a...

We present several recent studies based on statistical physics concepts that can be used as diagnostic tools for heart failure. We describe the scaling exponent characterizing the long-range correlations in heartbeat time series as well as the multifractal features recently discovered in...

Retail locational factors and strategies have been a focus of research among geographers, location analysts, marketing analysts, and regional scientists. Well known in the literature are the cumulative-attraction and interceptor-retail-location strategies. To analyze these strategies or forces...

In this paper the relationship between urban population size and land area of urbanized areas of the USA in 1960, 1970, and 1980 is analyzed by means of the allometric growth law. The US urban system of each of the above time periods is disaggregated into seven population-size classes and nine...

This paper includes an analysis of the evolution of urban spatial cognition over time among a sample of Chinese students attending Zhongshan University in Guangzhou, China. Changes in the features of sketch maps, based on classifications developed by Lynch, Appleyard, as well as Golledge, are...

Land-use succession theory has been the most thinly developed area in the study of urban land economics. In this paper a brief review of the spotty development of the land-use succession concept is first offered, followed by a discussion of the economic arguments of commercial land-use...