Erez Hatna
Erez Hatna
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Clinical Associate Professor of Epidemiology
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Professional overview
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Dr. Erez Hatna works in the fields of geoinformatics, spatial analysis, agent-based modeling, and studies urban dynamics, residential segregation, scaling laws of urban systems, and infectious disease modeling.
Dr. Hatna studies ethnic and economic residential patterns of cities using agent-based computational models of relocating households. The models simulate the formation of residential patterns as an outcome of relocation decisions of households. Dr. Hatna also studies the statistical regularities of urban systems and urban scaling. His research focuses on how the choice of urban boundaries influences the scaling relationships.
At NYU, Dr. Hatna is part of the Agent-based Modeling Lab, which works with large-scale epidemic models and cognitively plausible agents in order to produce a transformative synthesis for global public health modeling. Previously, he has conducted research at Wageningen University, University College London, and Johns Hopkins University.
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Education
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PhD, Geography, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, IsraelMA, Geography, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel
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Areas of research and study
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Agent-Based ModelingEpidemiologyGeographic Information Science (GIS)Geospatial MethodsInfectious DiseasesMathematical and Computational ModelingModeling Social and Behavioral DynamicsUrban Informatics
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Publications
Publications
The impact of anthropogenic factors on the behavior, reproduction, management and welfare of urban, free-roaming cat populations
The influence of neighbourhood socio-demographic factors on densities of free-roaming cat populations in an urban ecosystem in Israel
Assessing spatial uncertainties of land allocation using the scenario approach and sensitivity analysis
Tabeau, A., Hatna, E., & Verburg, P. (n.d.). In Proceedings to the International EAAE-SYAL Seminar. Spatial Dynamics in Agrifood Systems (1–).Publication year
2010From schelling to spatially explicit modeling of urban ethnic and economic residential dynamics
AbstractBenenson, I., Hatna, E., & Or, E. (n.d.).Publication year
2009Journal title
Sociological Methods and ResearchVolume
37Issue
4Page(s)
463-497AbstractThe robustness of outcomes to the parameterization of behavioral rules is a crucial property of any model aimed at simulating complex human systems. Schelling model of residential segregation satisfies this criterion. Based on the recently available high-resolution census GIS, we apply Schelling model for investigating urban population patterns at the resolution of individual buildings and families. First, we simulate ethnic residential dynamics in Yaffo (an area of Tel Aviv), and demonstrate good quantitative correspondence for a 40-year period. Second, we investigate income-based residential patterns in nine Israeli cities, reveal their high heterogeneity, and explain the latter by the presence of low fraction of wealthier householders who are tolerant of their poorer neighbors and reside in their proximity. We extend Schelling model in this direction and demonstrate qualitative correspondence between the model's outcomes and the observed income-based residential patterns.The Third State of the Schelling Model of Residential Dynamics
AbstractBenenson, I., & Hatna, E. (n.d.).Publication year
2009Journal title
arXivAbstractThe Schelling model of segregation between two groups of residential agents (Schelling 1971; Schelling 1978) reflects the most abstract view of the non-economic forces of residential migrations: be close to people of 'your own'. The model assumes that the residential agent, located in the neighborhood where the fraction of 'friends' is less than a predefined threshold value F, tries to relocate to a neighborhood for which this fraction is above F. It is well known that for the equal groups, depending on F, Schelling's residential pattern converges either to complete integration (random pattern) or segregation. We investigate Schelling model pattern dynamics as dependent on F, the ratio of the group numbers and the size of the neighborhood and demonstrate that the traditional integrate-segregate dichotomy is incomplete. In case of unequal groups, there exists the wide interval of the F-values that entails the third persistent residential pattern, in which part of the majority population segregates, while the rest remains integrated with the minority. We also demonstrate that Schelling model dynamics essentially depends on the description of agents' residential behavior. To obtain sociologically meaningful results, the agents should be satisficers, and the fraction of the agents who relocate irrespective of the neighborhood state should be non-zero.Building a city in vitro: The experiment and the simulation model
AbstractHatna, E., & Benenson, I. (n.d.).Publication year
2007Journal title
Environment and Planning B: Planning and DesignVolume
34Issue
4Page(s)
687-707AbstractAll current urban models accept the 'first-order recursion' view, namely, that the state of an urban system at time t is sufficient for predicting its state at t + 1. This assumption is not at all evident in the case of urban development, where the behavior of developers and planners is defined by the complex interaction between long-term and short-term plan guidelines, local spatial and temporal conditions, and individual entrepreneurial activity and cognition. In this paper we validate the first-order recursion approach in an artificial game environment: thirty geography students were asked to construct a 'city' on the floor of a large room, with each student using the same set of fifty-two building mock-ups. Based on the analysis of game outcomes, the first-order recursive set of behavioral rules shared by all the participants is estimated and further employed for computer generation of artificial cities. Comparison between the human-built and model patterns reveals that the constructed set of rules is sufficient for representing the dynamics of the majority of experimental patterns; however, the behavior of some participants differs and we analyze these differences. We consider this experiment as a preliminary yet important step towards the adequate modeling of decision-making behavior among real developers and planners.Study of Urban Developers' behavior in a Game Environment
Hatna, E., & Benenson, I. (n.d.). In S. Albeverio, D. Andrey, P. Goirdano, & A. Vancheri (Eds.), The dynamics of complex urban systems (1–).Publication year
2007Page(s)
265-286Defining localities of inadequate treatment for childhood asthma: A GIS approach
Geo-simulation of urban dynamics
Agent-based modeling of householders' migration behavior and its consequences
Entity-based modeling of urban residential dynamics: The case of Yaffo, Tel Aviv
Modeling Human Residential Behavior
Omer, I., Hatna, E., & Benenson, I. (n.d.). In Proceedings to the first Georgian-Israeli Geographical Seminar (1–).Publication year
2000Page(s)
116-137