February 22, 2012 at 12:57 PM

Complexity scientists have made great strides in understanding the behaviour of single networks. Now they want to know what happens when networks become connected to each other.

In the last decade or so, the study of networks has had a profound effect on the way we understand the spread of everything from fashion and ideas to forest fires and disease. 

But this better understanding of individual networks has revealed a gaping hole in our knowledge of how networks interact with each other. That looks to be hugely important. Many systems, rather than being individual networks, are actually networks of networks: the financial system, the economy, our brain and our genetic control system to name just a few.

What's puzzling about all these systems is that they demonstrate emergent behaviour that single networks alone cannot reproduce. 

So it's no surprise that with the triumphs in understanding single networks under their belts, complexity scientists have set their sights on the more ambitious goal of understanding 'networks of networks'. Consequently, this area is set to become one of the fastest growing in science.  

Today, Anna Saumell-Mendiola, Angeles Serrano and Marian Boguna at the University of Barcelona in Spain reveal their approach to the problem. These guys have studied the way that disease-spreading networks interact when they become linked.
via technology review

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