title: Slow switching in globally coupled oscillators: robustness and occurrence through delayed coupling.
abstract: The phenomenon of slow switching in populations of globally coupled oscillators is discussed. This characteristic collective dynamics, which was first discovered in a particular class of the phase oscillator model, is a result of the formation of a heteroclinic loop connecting a pair of clustered states of the population. We argue that the same behavior can arise in a wider class of oscillator models with the amplitude degree of freedom. We also argue how such heteroclinic loops arise inevitably and persist robustly in a homogeneous population of globally coupled oscillators. Although a heteroclinic loop might seem to arise only exceptionally, we find that it appears rather easily by introducing time delay into a population which would otherwise exhibit perfect phase synchrony. We argue that the appearance of the heteroclinic loop induced by the delayed coupling is then characterized by transcritical and saddle-node bifurcations. Slow switching arises when a system with a heteroclinic loop is weakly perturbed. This will be demonstrated with a vector model by applying weak noises. Other types of weak symmetry-breaking perturbations can also cause slow switching.
authors: Department of Physics, Graduate School of Sciences, Kyoto University, Kyoto 606-8502, Japan. kori@ton.scphys.kyoto-u.ac.jp
authors: H
authors: H
authors: Kori
authors: Y
authors: Y
authors: Kuramoto