Simon Levin is the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor at Princeton University, working with BHI as an Academic Fellow on translating biological models to business strategy. Simon’s research interests have been in complexity—and in understanding how macroscopic patterns and processes are maintained at the level of ecosystems and the biosphere, in terms of ecological and evolutionary mechanisms that operate primarily at the level of organisms.

In recent years, he has turned his attention to the parallels between ecological systems and financial and economic systems, particularly with regard to what makes them vulnerable to collapse, and to the evolution and development of structure and organization. Much of his ecological research is concerned with the evolution of diversification, the mechanisms sustaining biological diversity in natural systems, and the implications for ecosystem structure and functioning.