Coherence resonance in influencer networks

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that applying optimal noise to influencer nodes in complex networks enhances synchronization, revealing a nonlinear coherence resonance effect driven by network structure and stochasticity.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of coherence resonance in influencer networks, showing how noise optimally applied to hubs improves network synchronization.

Findings

Optimal noise intensity enhances synchronization in influencer networks.

Coherence resonance is a nonlinear effect dependent on noise strength.

Influencer hubs significantly increase the network's dynamical response.

Abstract

Complex networks are abundant in nature and many share an important structural property: they contain a few nodes that are abnormally highly connected (hubs). Some of these hubs are called influencers because they couple strongly to the network and play fundamental dynamical and structural roles. Strikingly, despite the abundance of networks with influencers, little is known about their response to stochastic forcing. Here, for oscillatory dynamics on influencer networks, we show that subjecting influencers to an optimal intensity of noise can result in enhanced network synchronization. This new network dynamical effect, which we call coherence resonance in influencer networks, emerges from a synergy between network structure and stochasticity and is highly nonlinear, vanishing when the noise is too weak or too strong. Our results reveal that the influencer backbone can sharply increase the dynamical response in complex systems of coupled oscillators.