title: Phase Diffusion in Unequally Noisy Coupled Oscillators.
abstract: We consider the dynamics of two directionally coupled unequally noisy oscillators, the first oscillator being noisier than the second oscillator. We derive analytically the phase diffusion coefficient of both oscillators in a heterogeneous setup (different frequencies, coupling coefficients, and intrinsic noise intensities) and show that the phase coherence of the second oscillator depends in a nonmonotonic fashion on the noise intensity of the first oscillator: as the first oscillator becomes less coherent, i.e., worse, the second one becomes more coherent, i.e., better. This surprising effect is related to the statistics of the first oscillator which provides a source of noise for the second oscillator, that is non-Gaussian, bounded, and possesses a finite bandwidth. We verify that the effect is robust by numerical simulations of two coupled FitzHugh-Nagumo models.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio 45701, USA.
authors.forename: Rami M
authors.initials: RM
authors.lastname: Amro
authors.affiliation: Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience Berlin, Philippstraße 13, Haus 2, 10115 Berlin, Germany.|Department of Physics, Humboldt Universität zu Berlin, Newtonstrasse 15, 12489 Berlin, Germany.
authors.forename: Benjamin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Lindner
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio 45701, USA.
authors.forename: Alexander B
authors.initials: AB
authors.lastname: Neiman