Dynamical processes and emergent behaviors in multiplex networks

TL;DR

This paper reviews the modeling and analysis of complex dynamical processes on multiplex networks, highlighting mechanisms leading to emergent behaviors unique to multilayer structures.

Contribution

It provides a unified framework for understanding diverse dynamics on multiplex networks and emphasizes phenomena that cannot occur in aggregated or isolated layers.

Findings

Identification of structural and dynamical correlations as key to emergent behaviors

Unified description of processes like percolation, synchronization, and epidemic spreading on multiplex networks

Summary of a decade of research advances in multiplex network dynamics

Abstract

Over the last two decades, network science has greatly advanced our understanding of how the collective behaviors of a complex system emerge from the interactions among its basic units. Multiplex networks, i.e. networks with many layers, whose nodes are in one-to-one correspondence, provide a more realistic description for social, biological and ecological systems where multiple types of interactions coexist. After a brief introduction on how to model the architecture of multiplex networks, we present a complete overview of the different dynamics which can unfold over these structures. We present a unified framework to describe dynamical processes such as percolation, reaction-diffusion, synchronization, epidemic spreading, social dynamics and games on multiplex networks, as well as the coupled evolution of different dynamical processes, and the coevolution of a process with the network structure. Our focus is on truly-multiplex collective behaviors, i.e., all those phenomena which cannot emerge on the corresponding aggregated networks, or when the different layers of these systems are considered in isolation. We identify three main mechanisms leading to new collective behaviors: the existence of structural correlations across layers, the presence of dynamical correlations in the processes taking place at the different layers, and the dynamical interplay of inter- and intra-layer interactions. We conclude with a summary of the main takeaways from a decade of work in the field.