Stability and Hopf Bifurcation of a Three-Neuron Network with Multiple Discrete and Distributed Delays

In this paper, a class of three-neuron network with discrete and distributed delays is introduced. We first give a detailed Hopf bifurcation analysis for the proposed network. Choosing the discrete time delay as a bifurcation parameter, the existence of Hopf bifurcation is studied. Moreover, by using the normal form theory and center manifold theorem, the formulae determining the direction of the bifurcations and the stability of the bifurcating periodic solutions are derived. Finally, numerical simulations are presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of our theoretical results.