When the MIT Big Data Challenge asked, “What can you learn from data about 2.3 million taxi rides?” graduate students in CEE Professor Marta González’ Human Mobility and Networks Lab (HuMNet) had some answers. The students were able to predict the number of taxi pickups that had occurred in 700 time intervals at 36 locations in the Boston area, winning the competition. González and the students in her HuMNet Lab use statistical physics and network theory on massive-passive data generated by cellphones and other networked systems to identify relevant patterns and make inferences about human mobility and other aspects of city science. González teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in these methodologies and participates in CEE’s graduate degree program in computational science and engineering (CSE in CEE). Read a news release.