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NETWORK SCIENCE

Propagation patterns unravelled

Nature Physics volume 15, pages 308–309 (2019)Cite this article

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From disease proliferation to cell functioning, spreading dynamics on networks impact many collective phenomena. The joint contributions of the interaction structure and local dynamics have now been disentangled, revealing three distinct types of spreading pattern.

In a cell, changes in the abundance of one protein generate transient alterations of activity patterns throughout its biochemical reaction network. Analogously, following a local outbreak, infectious diseases may spread to distant places as a result of human travel. In these distributed networked systems, a change that has occurred earlier at a given location affects other units — here, the abundance of one cellular component or a local human population — only after an induced signal has propagated across the network. The joint time evolution of the signals at all units yields a variety of complex spatiotemporal patterns. Yet, key collective properties of these modes of transient dynamics remain unknown. Now, writing in Nature Physics, Chittaranjan Hens and co-workers have revealed how the intrinsic dynamics of the units and of their interactions, as well as the topology of the interaction network, all participate in giving rise to qualitatively different types of spatiotemporal network pattern in response to localized changes1. In the future, such insights might help to predict, contain or enhance signals spreading in networked dynamical systems.

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Fig. 1: Different types of transient signal propagation.

References

  1. Hens, C., Harush, U., Haber, S., Cohen, R. & Barzel, B. Nat. Phys. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-018-0409-0 (2019).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute for Theoretical Physics and Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden, Technische Universität Dresden, Dresden, Germany

    Marc Timme

  2. Frankfurt School of Finance & Management, Frankfurt, Germany

    Jan Nagler

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  1. Marc Timme
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  2. Jan Nagler
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Correspondence to Marc Timme or Jan Nagler.

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Timme, M., Nagler, J. Propagation patterns unravelled. Nat. Phys. 15, 308–309 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-019-0424-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-019-0424-9

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