English

The spatial structure of networks

Statistical Mechanics 2007-05-23 v1 Disordered Systems and Neural Networks

Abstract

We study networks that connect points in geographic space, such as transportation networks and the Internet. We find that there are strong signatures in these networks of topography and use patterns, giving the networks shapes that are quite distinct from one another and from non-geographic networks. We offer an explanation of these differences in terms of the costs and benefits of transportation and communication, and give a simple model based on the Monte Carlo optimization of these costs and benefits that reproduces well the qualitative features of the networks studied.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.cond-mat/0407680,
  title  = {The spatial structure of networks},
  author = {Michael T. Gastner and M. E. J. Newman},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/0407680},
  year   = {2007}
}

Comments

5 pages, 3 figures

R2 v1 2026-07-22T11:06:02.136Z