Synchronization of phase oscillators on complex hypergraphs

We study the effect of structured higher-order interactions on the collective behavior of coupled phase oscillators. By combining a hypergraph generative model with dimensionality reduction techniques, we obtain a reduced system of differential equations for the system's order parameters. We illustrate our framework with the example of a hypergraph with hyperedges of sizes 2 (links) and 3 (triangles). For this case, we obtain a set of two coupled nonlinear algebraic equations for the order parameters. For strong values of coupling via triangles, the system exhibits bistability and explosive synchronization transitions. We find conditions that lead to bistability in terms of hypergraph properties and validate our predictions with numerical simulations. Our results provide a general framework to study the synchronization of phase oscillators in hypergraphs, and they can be extended to hypergraphs with hyperedges of arbitrary sizes, dynamic-structural correlations, and other features.

Automated summary

We investigate the influence of structured higher-order interactions on the collective behavior of coupled phase oscillators. Using a combination of hypergraph generative model and dimensionality reduction techniques, we derive a reduced system of differential equations for the order parameters of the system. By studying a hypergraph with hyperedges of sizes 2 and 3, we obtain a set of two coupled nonlinear algebraic equations for the order parameters. The system exhibits bistability and explosive synchronization transitions under strong coupling via triangles, and we validate our predictions with numerical simulations. Our results provide a general framework to study synchronization of phase oscillators in hypergraphs with various characteristics.