Equivalence of replica and cavity methods for computing spectra of sparse random matrices

Dynamical systems on large networks with predator-prey interactions are stable and exhibit oscillations

We analyze the stability of linear dynamical systems defined on sparse, random graphs with predator-prey, competitive, and mutualistic interactions. These systems are aimed at modeling the stability of fixed points in large systems defined on complex networks, such as ecosystems consisting of a large number of species that interact through a food web. We develop an exact theory for the spectral distribution and the leading eigenvalue of the corresponding sparse Jacobian matrices. This theory reveals that the nature of local interactions has a strong influence on a system's stability. We show that, in general, linear dynamical systems defined on random graphs with a prescribed degree distribution of unbounded support are unstable if they are large enough, implying a tradeoff between stability and diversity. Remarkably, in contrast to the generic case, antagonistic systems that contain only interactions of the predator-prey type can be stable in the infinite size limit. This feature for antagonistic systems is accompanied by a peculiar oscillatory behavior of the dynamical response of the system after a perturbation, when the mean degree of the graph is small enough. Moreover, for antagonistic systems we also find that there exist a dynamical phase transition and critical mean degree above which the response becomes nonoscillatory.

Unifying model for random matrix theory in arbitrary space dimensions

A sparse random block matrix model suggested by the Hessian matrix used in the study of elastic vibrational modes of amorphous solids is presented and analyzed. By evaluating some moments, benchmarked against numerics, differences in the eigenvalue spectrum of this model in different limits of space dimension d, and for arbitrary values of the lattice coordination number Z, are shown and discussed. As a function of these two parameters (and their ratio Z/d), the most studied models in random matrix theory (Erdos-Renyi graphs, effective medium, and replicas) can be reproduced in the various limits of block dimensionality d. Remarkably, the Marchenko-Pastur spectral density (which is recovered by replica calculations for the Laplacian matrix) is reproduced exactly in the limit of infinite size of the blocks, or d→∞, which clarifies the physical meaning of space dimension in these models. We feel that the approximate results for d=3 provided by our method may have many potential applications in the future, from the vibrational spectrum of glasses and elastic networks to wave localization, disordered conductors, random resistor networks, and random walks.

Identifying network structure similarity using spectral graph theory

Most real networks are too large or they are not available for real time analysis. Therefore, in practice, decisions are made based on partial information about the ground truth network. It is of great interest to have metrics to determine if an inferred network (the partial information network) is similar to the ground truth. In this paper we develop a test for similarity between the inferred and the true network. Our research utilizes a network visualization tool, which systematically discovers a network, producing a sequence of snapshots of the network. We introduce and test our metric on the consecutive snapshots of a network, and against the ground truth. To test the scalability of our metric we use a random matrix theory approach while discovering Erdös-Rényi graphs. This scaling analysis allows us to make predictions about the performance of the discovery process.

Localization in random bipartite graphs: Numerical and empirical study

We investigate adjacency matrices of bipartite graphs with a power-law degree distribution. Motivation for this study is twofold: first, vibrational states in granular matter and jammed sphere packings; second, graphs encoding social interaction, especially electronic commerce. We establish the position of the mobility edge and show that it strongly depends on the power in the degree distribution and on the ratio of the sizes of the two parts of the bipartite graph. At the jamming threshold, where the two parts have the same size, localization vanishes. We found that the multifractal spectrum is nontrivial in the delocalized phase, but still near the mobility edge. We also study an empirical bipartite graph, namely, the Amazon reviewer-item network. We found that in this specific graph the mobility edge disappears, and we draw a conclusion from this fact regarding earlier empirical studies of the Amazon network.

Universality in the spectral and eigenfunction properties of random networks

By the use of extensive numerical simulations, we show that the nearest-neighbor energy-level spacing distribution P(s) and the entropic eigenfunction localization length of the adjacency matrices of Erdős-Rényi (ER) fully random networks are universal for fixed average degree ξ≡αN (α and N being the average network connectivity and the network size, respectively). We also demonstrate that the Brody distribution characterizes well P(s) in the transition from α=0, when the vertices in the network are isolated, to α=1, when the network is fully connected. Moreover, we explore the validity of our findings when relaxing the randomness of our network model and show that, in contrast to standard ER networks, ER networks with diagonal disorder also show universality. Finally, we also discuss the spectral and eigenfunction properties of small-world networks.

Properties of networks with partially structured and partially random connectivity

Networks studied in many disciplines, including neuroscience and mathematical biology, have connectivity that may be stochastic about some underlying mean connectivity represented by a non-normal matrix. Furthermore, the stochasticity may not be independent and identically distributed (iid) across elements of the connectivity matrix. More generally, the problem of understanding the behavior of stochastic matrices with nontrivial mean structure and correlations arises in many settings. We address this by characterizing large random N×N matrices of the form A=M+LJR, where M,L, and R are arbitrary deterministic matrices and J is a random matrix of zero-mean iid elements. M can be non-normal, and L and R allow correlations that have separable dependence on row and column indices. We first provide a general formula for the eigenvalue density of A. For A non-normal, the eigenvalues do not suffice to specify the dynamics induced by A, so we also provide general formulas for the transient evolution of the magnitude of activity and frequency power spectrum in an N-dimensional linear dynamical system with a coupling matrix given by A. These quantities can also be thought of as characterizing the stability and the magnitude of the linear response of a nonlinear network to small perturbations about a fixed point. We derive these formulas and work them out analytically for some examples of M,L, and R motivated by neurobiological models. We also argue that the persistence as N→∞ of a finite number of randomly distributed outlying eigenvalues outside the support of the eigenvalue density of A, as previously observed, arises in regions of the complex plane Ω where there are nonzero singular values of L(-1)(z1-M)R(-1) (for z∈Ω) that vanish as N→∞. When such singular values do not exist and L and R are equal to the identity, there is a correspondence in the normalized Frobenius norm (but not in the operator norm) between the support of the spectrum of A for J of norm σ and the σ pseudospectrum of M.