title: Self-healing networks: redundancy and structure.
abstract: We introduce the concept of self-healing in the field of complex networks modelling; in particular, self-healing capabilities are implemented through distributed communication protocols that exploit redundant links to recover the connectivity of the system. We then analyze the effect of the level of redundancy on the resilience to multiple failures; in particular, we measure the fraction of nodes still served for increasing levels of network damages. Finally, we study the effects of redundancy under different connectivity patterns-from planar grids, to small-world, up to scale-free networks-on healing performances. Small-world topologies show that introducing some long-range connections in planar grids greatly enhances the resilience to multiple failures with performances comparable to the case of the most resilient (and least realistic) scale-free structures. Obvious applications of self-healing are in the important field of infrastructural networks like gas, power, water, oil distribution systems.
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for the modeling of biological and socio-technical systems, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America ; LIMS the London Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Mayfair, London, United Kingdom ; IMT Alti Studi Lucca, Lucca, Italy.
authors.forename: Walter
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Quattrociocchi
authors.affiliation: IMT Alti Studi Lucca, Lucca, Italy ; ISC-CNR Uos "Sapienza", Roma, Italy ; LIMS the London Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Mayfair, London, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Guido
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Caldarelli
authors.affiliation: ISC-CNR Uos "Sapienza", Roma, Italy ; IMT Alti Studi Lucca, Lucca, Italy ; LIMS the London Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Mayfair, London, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Scala
mesh_terms: D000465:Algorithms; D003195:Computer Communication Networks; D003198:Computer Simulation; D011211:Electric Power Supplies; D014881:Water Supply