The contact process on dynamical scale-free networks

TL;DR

This paper studies how the contact process behaves on evolving scale-free networks, revealing different extinction regimes and phase transitions depending on network parameters and dynamics.

Contribution

It introduces a model of the contact process on dynamical scale-free networks with vertex-dependent edge updates, analyzing phase transitions and metastability.

Findings

Identification of parameter regimes with fast and slow extinction.

Discovery of metastable exponents undergoing phase transitions.

Dependence of extinction behavior on degree distribution and update rates.

Abstract

We investigate the contact process on four different types of scale-free inhomogeneous random graphs evolving according to a stationary dynamics, where each potential edge is updated with a rate depending on the strength of the adjacent vertices. Depending on the type of graph, the tail exponent of the degree distribution and the updating rate, we find parameter regimes of fast and slow extinction and in the latter case identify metastable exponents that undergo first order phase transitions.