2008/02/25 by Vittoria Colizza, Alessandro Vespignani · 1 citation
Physics and Astronomy · Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology · #physics.soc-ph #cond-mat.stat-mech #q-bio.PE
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.99.148701
published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 148701 (2007) · 4 pages, 2 figures
arxiv created 2008/02/25 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01
We study the dynamics of epidemic and reaction-diffusion processes in metapopulation models with heterogeneous connectivity pattern. In SIR-like processes, along with the standard local epidemic threshold, the system exhibits a global invasion threshold. We provide an explicit expression of the threshold that sets a critical value of the diffusion/mobility rate below which the epidemic is not able to spread to a macroscopic fraction of subpopulations. The invasion threshold is found to be affected by the topological fluctuations of the metapopulation network. The presented results provide a general framework for the understanding of the effect of travel restrictions in epidemic containment.