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Complex networks

Degrees of control

Nature volume 473, pages 158–159 (2011)Cite this article

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One might expect that social networks would generally be harder to control than naturally occurring systems such as biological networks. But this is not so, according to a new study. See Article p.167

Networks can be found all around us. Examples include social networks (both online and offline), mobile sensor networks and gene regulatory networks. Such constructs can be represented by nodes and by edges (connections) between the nodes. The nodes are individual decision makers, for instance people on the social-networking website Facebook or DNA segments in a cell. The edges are the means by which information flows and is shared between nodes. But how hard is it to control the behaviour of such complex networks? On page 167 of this issue, Liu et al.1 show that the answer to this question is anything but intuitive.

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Figure 1: Tough job.

AP PHOTO/J. ACOSTA

References

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  1. Magnus Egerstedt is in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332, USA.,

    Magnus Egerstedt

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  1. Magnus Egerstedt
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Correspondence to Magnus Egerstedt.

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Egerstedt, M. Degrees of control. Nature 473, 158–159 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/473158a

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