Fondazione Romeo ed Enrica Invernizzi Chair in Computer Science
Marc Mézard is a Professor of Theoretical Physics at Bocconi University. After studying at the École normale supérieure in Paris, he earned his PhD in 1984. He served as a Research Director at CNRS and at Université Paris Sud. From 2012 to 2022, he was the Director of the École normale supérieure, before moving to Bocconi, where he joined the newly established Department of Computing Sciences.
Marc’s research focuses on the study of emergent phenomena in complex systems composed of many interacting elements, which can include atoms, molecules, bits of information, or economic agents. The statistical physics of disordered systems—a field to which he has made significant contributions—has applications across various disciplines, including biology, economics and finance, information theory, computer science, statistics, and signal processing.
In recent years, his research has particularly centered on information processing in neural systems, machine learning, and deep neural networks. He is especially interested in the theoretical impact of data structure on learning strategies and the generalization capabilities of models.
Chair Holder - Marc Mezard
Joint Purpose
In today’s world, the rapid pace of technological advancement is profoundly transforming the way we live, communicate, learn, and participate in democratic life. The ways in which information is generated, transmitted, and interpreted have a deep impact on institutions, the economy, markets, and the public sphere.
These changes present new challenges, but also new opportunities, which call for an integrated approach between computational and social sciences. In this context, Bocconi University—long committed to the role of social sciences in interpreting reality—recognizes that both the theoretical and applied understanding of computer science and complex systems has become essential to addressing the major questions of our time.
The establishment of the Chair in Computer Science, created in collaboration with the Invernizzi Foundation, represents a key step in promoting cutting-edge multidisciplinary research that bridges formal and mathematical modeling with critical analysis of social, cultural, and economic transformations.
Research
The Chair aims to develop a research program focused on studying the mechanisms underlying information processing in complex systems, both natural and artificial. Computer science—viewed not only as a technological discipline but as a fundamental science of information—offers powerful theoretical and conceptual tools for analyzing emergent phenomena across a wide range of contexts: neural networks, financial markets, interactions among economic agents, biological evolution, and machine learning.
The approach will be strongly interdisciplinary, combining statistical physics with information theory, machine learning with complexity theory, and rigorously analyzing the impact of data structure on learning processes and predictive performance.
From a teaching perspective, the Chair seeks to educate students who are not only aware of the technical implications of modern computer science, but also of its ethical, social, and epistemological dimensions. Topics such as data security, algorithmic transparency, responsibility in the use of artificial intelligence, and the role of networks in organizing information will be an integral part of the educational path.