Generation of scale-free networks using a simple preferential rewiring dynamics

Many networks exhibit scale free behavior where their degree distribution obeys a power law for large vertex degrees. Models constructed to explain this phenomena have relied on preferential attachment where the networks grow by the addition of both vertices and edges, and the edges attach themselves to a vertex with a probability proportional to its degree. Simulations hint, though not conclusively, that both growth and preferential attachment are necessary for scale free be...

The past two decades have seen significant successes in our understanding of complex networked systems, from the mapping of real-world social, biological and technological networks to the establishment of generative models recovering their observed macroscopic patterns. These advances, however, are restricted to pairwise interactions, captured by dyadic links, and provide limited insight into higher-order structure, in which a group of several components represents the basic ...

Complex networks in different areas exhibit degree distributions with heavy upper tail. A preferential attachment mechanism in a growth process produces a graph with this feature. We herein investigate a variant of the simple preferential attachment model, whose modifications are interesting for two main reasons: to analyze more realistic models and to study the robustness of the scale free behavior of the degree distribution. We introduce and study a model which takes into a...

Complex networks across various fields are often considered to be scale free -- a statistical property usually solely characterized by a power-law distribution of the nodes' degree $k$. However, this characterization is incomplete. In real-world networks, the distribution of the degree-degree distance $\eta$, a simple link-based metric of network connectivity similar to $k$, appears to exhibit a stronger power-law distribution than $k$. While offering an alternative character...

We propose a simple random process inducing various types of random graphs and the scale free random graphs among others. The model is of a threshold nature and differs from the preferential attachment approach discussed in the literature before. The degree statistics of a random graph in our model is governed by the control parameter $\eta$ stirring the pure exponential statistics for the degree distribution (at $\eta=0,$ when a threshold is changed each time a new edge ad...

We introduce a collection of complex networks generated by a combination of preferential attachment and a previously unexamined process of "splitting" nodes of degree $k$ into $k$ nodes of degree 1. Four networks are considered, each evolves at each time step by either preferential attachment, with probability $p$, or splitting with probability $1-p$. Two methods of attachment are considered; first, attachment of an edge between a newly created node and existing node in the n...

We introduce a non-growth model that generates the power-law distribution with the Zipf exponent. There are N elements, each of which is characterized by a quantity, and at each time step these quantities are redistributed through binary random interactions with a simple additive preferential rule, while the sum of quantities is conserved. The situation described by this model is similar to those of closed $N$-particle systems when conservative two-body collisions are only al...

We present an evolving network model in which the total numbers of nodes and edges are conserved, but in which edges are continuously rewired according to nonlinear preferential detachment and reattachment. Assuming power-law kernels with exponents alpha and beta, the stationary states the degree distributions evolve towards exhibit a second order phase transition - from relatively homogeneous to highly heterogeneous (with the emergence of starlike structures) at alpha = beta...

Random networks with complex topology are common in Nature, describing systems as diverse as the world wide web or social and business networks. Recently, it has been demonstrated that most large networks for which topological information is available display scale-free features. Here we study the scaling properties of the recently introduced scale-free model, that can account for the observed power-law distribution of the connectivities. We develop a mean-field method to pre...

We introduce a new mechanism of connectivity evolution in networks to account for the emergence of scale-free behavior. The mechanism works on a fixed set of nodes and promotes growth from a minimally connected initial topology by the addition of edges. A new edge is added between two nodes depending on the trade-off between a gain and a cost function of local connectivity and communication properties. We report on simulation results that indicate the appearance of power-law ...