Most of you have used a navigation app like Google Maps for your travels at some point. These apps rely on algorithms that compute shortest paths through vast networks. Now imagine scaling that task to calculate distances between every pair of points in a massive system, for example, a transportation grid, a communication backbone, or even a biological network such as protein or neural interaction networks.Most of you have used a navigation app like Google Maps for your travels at some point. These apps rely on algorithms that compute shortest paths through vast networks. Now imagine scaling that task to calculate distances between every pair of points in a massive system, for example, a transportation grid, a communication backbone, or even a biological network such as protein or neural interaction networks.[#item_full_content]