DrTim Evans

Note there is more than one Tim Evans at Imperial College (the other is a medic) so use my ORCID identifier to find my outputs..

I am an associate professor in the Abdus Salam Centre for Theoretical Physics but my main focus is as a co-director of the cross-disciplinary Centre for Complexity Science. I did my first degree in Natural Sciences (theoretical Physics) at Cambridge. I then studied for my PhD here at Imperial, supervised by Ray Rivers before spending time as a researcher at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada. Since then I have held research positions back here at Imperial, in part as a Royal Society University Research Fellow, before being appointed as a lecturer at Imperial.

My main interest is in the behaviour of many-body systems both in and out of equilibrium. Currently, I am interested in ideas falling under the broad area of complexity. In particular, the properties of Complex Networks, such as the "six degrees of separation", intrigue me.

From a theoretical perspective, I draw on ideas from my background in theoretical physics such as statistical physics (random walks), geometry (space-time) and information theory (entropy). My present focus is on the analysis of complex networks in the presence of constraints such as geographical space or the arrow of time. These could be internal constraints creating groups in networks, the problem of community detection in networks, or it could be the behaviour of networks constrained by time and networks constrained by space.

In terms of applications, I apply my results to a wide range of areas, but I am particularly interested in social systems. The role of time in the flow of innovation, as captured in the citation patterns of papers and patents, is an example of how I apply my ideas in the field sometimes known as the Science of Science (bibliometrics). I have a long-standing collaboration in archaeology which has led in turn to my interest in geographical models for both ancient and modern contexts.

I have also worked on Quantum Field Theory. My main focus was on many-body problems, a topic known as Thermal Field Theory or Finite Temperature Field Theory.

Contact Details:

My office in Theoretical Physics is H609 in the Huxley Building on Queens Gate on the corner with Prince Consort Road, 44 (0)20 7594 7837.

My official postal address is Theoretical Physics, Physics Department, Imperial College London, South Kensington Campus, London, SW7 2AZ, UK

Teaching

From Autumn 2025 I will give the Unification lecture course to final year undergraduates and masters students. This looks at how we construct theories describing fundamental physics using symmetry and the course uses these ideas to construct the standard model of particle physics. I helped to develop a new third-year course "Data Science and Machine Learning for Physics" which ran for the first time in Spring 2024. In the past, I have given a variety of courses on a wide range of topics such as Statistical Physics (percolation), Network Science, Group Theory, Quantum Field Theory, and Quantum Theory of Matter.

I run a number of BSc and MSci undergraduate projects. All my projects are done in pairs and are theoretically or numerically inclined. The Physics MSc projects are based on similar topics to the undergraduate ones. See the relevant web pages for lists of projects. Through a combination of hard work and simple luck, the work on some of these projects has been turned into research papers.

I am also a personal tutor, looking after the general academic and general welfare of several students, both undergraduate and masters students.