Amy Maxmen, writing for the Nature News Blog:
What better birthplace for an institute of urban science than a soot-stained edifice in downtown Brooklyn. New York City Mayor Bloomberg announced yesterday that the mainly vacant building will house a world class research institute, to be led by theoretical physicist Steven Koonin, former undersecretary for science at the US Department of Energy.
At the upcoming Center for Urban Science and Progress (CUSP), researchers will crunch data on aspects of the city in order to solve problems related to energy and healthcare among others. Koonin says urban science means “understanding and modeling the city as a totality — its system of systems, its infrastructure, its condition and its operation.”