A finely tuned mess-how disorder can make networks more stable

edited by Swati Mestri , reviewed by Robert Egan

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Add as preferred source An evolving paradigm in network science, from regular lattices and random graphs to complex networks with heterogeneous nodes and links. Credit: Camila Felix Perfection is overrated—at least when it comes to complex systems like the power grid, food webs and advanced materials. For decades, scientists generally assumed that networks function most reliably when their individual components are as similar as possible. But real-world networks are rarely uniform.

Generators in a power grid, neurons in a brain, animals in a food web and components in a material all differ in ways that scientists traditionally treated as imperfections.

Now, Northwestern University physicists are overturning that long-held assumption.