Steen Rasmussen (born 7 July 1955) is a Danish physicist mainly working in the areas of

artificial life Artificial life (often abbreviated ALife or A-Life) is a field of study wherein researchers examine systems related to natural life, its processes, and its evolution, through the use of simulations with computer models, robotics, and biochemistry ...

and

complex systems A complex system is a system composed of many components which may interact with each other. Examples of complex systems are Earth's global climate, organisms, the human brain, infrastructure such as power grid, transportation or communication s ...

. He is currently a professor in physics and a center director at

University of Southern Denmark The University of Southern Denmark ( da, Syddansk Universitet, lit=South Danish University, abbr. SDU) is a university in Denmark that has campuses located in Southern Denmark and on Zealand. The university offers a number of joint programmes in ...

as well as an external research professor at the

Santa Fe Institute The Santa Fe Institute (SFI) is an independent, nonprofit theoretical research institute located in Santa Fe, New Mexico, United States and dedicated to the multidisciplinary study of the fundamental principles of complex adaptive systems, includ ...

. His formal training was at the

Technical University of Denmark The Technical University of Denmark ( da, Danmarks Tekniske Universitet), often simply referred to as DTU, is a polytechnic university and school of engineering. It was founded in 1829 at the initiative of Hans Christian Ørsted as Denmark's fi ...

(1985 PhD in physics of complex systems) and

University of Copenhagen The University of Copenhagen ( da, Københavns Universitet, KU) is a prestigious public university, public research university in Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded in 1479, the University of Copenhagen is the second-oldest university in ...

(philosophy). He spent 20 years as a researcher at

Los Alamos National Laboratory Los Alamos National Laboratory (often shortened as Los Alamos and LANL) is one of the sixteen research and development laboratories of the United States Department of Energy (DOE), located a short distance northwest of Santa Fe, New Mexico, ...

(1988-2007) the last five years as a leader of the Self-Organized Systems team. He has been part of the

since 1988. The main scientific effort of Rasmussen has since 2001 has been to explore, understand and construct a transition from nonliving to living materials. Bridging this gap requires an interdisciplinary scientific effort, which is why he has assembled, sponsored and lead research teams in the US, across Europe and in Denmark. He became a scientific team leader in 2002 at Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA, and he has since held research leadership positions at the

and

. In 2004 he represented Los Alamos National Laboratory scientifically in cofounding together with primarily European scientific institutions the European Centre for Living Technology in Venice, Italy where he later served as Chairman of the Science Board. Since late 2007 he has been the director of the Center for Fundamental Living Technology at

. In 2018 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award form the International Society of Artificial LIfe (ISAL) Rasmussen has for many years been actively engaged in the public discourse regarding science and society and on this background he founded The Initiative for Science, Society and Policy (ISSP) in 2009. ISSP is currently funded by two Danish universities, has a Director, five Science Focus Leaders and a Science Board. In 2018 he received the

Lifetime Achievement Award Lifetime achievement awards are awarded by various organizations, to recognize contributions over the whole of a career, rather than or in addition to single contributions. Such awards, and organizations presenting them, include: A * A.C. ...

from the International Society of Artificial Life (ISAL).

External links

Steen Rasmussen at SDU

Steen Rasmussen at SFI
{{DEFAULTSORT:Rasmussen, Steen 1955 births Living people Danish physicists Researchers of artificial life Digital organisms Santa Fe Institute people