Model for cascading failures in complex networks

2003/09/30 by Paolo Crucitti, Vito Latora, Massimo Marchiori · 2 citations
Computer Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Complex Network Analysis Techniques #Network Security and Intrusion Detection #Opinion Dynamics and Social Influence #cond-mat.other

paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physreve.69.045104

published as Phys. Rev. E 69 (2004) 045104R · 4 pages, 4 figures

arxiv created 2004/03/24 · openalex publication_date 2004/04/29 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/04

Abstract

Large but rare cascades triggered by small initial shocks are present in most of the infrastructure networks. Here we present a simple model for cascading failures based on the dynamical redistribution of the flow on the network. We show that the breakdown of a single node is sufficient to collapse the efficiency of the entire system if the node is among the ones with largest load. This is particularly important for real-world networks with a highly hetereogeneous distribution of loads as the Internet and electrical power grids.

Citations

• Community structure in social and biological networks
• Emergence of scaling in random networks
• Error and attack tolerance of complex networks
• Evolution of networks
• On random graphs. I.

Cited by

• Protecting infrastructure networks from cost-based attacks
• Efficiency of informational transfer in regular and complex networks