Fluctuations in percolation of sparse complex networks

Abstract

We study the role of fluctuations in percolation of sparse complex networks. To this end we consider two random correlated realizations of the initial damage of the nodes and we evaluate the fraction of nodes that are expected to remain in the giant component of the network in both cases or just in one case. Our framework includes a message-passing algorithm able to predict the fluctuations in a single network, and an analytic prediction of the expected fluctuations in ensembles of sparse networks. This approach is applied to real ecological and infrastructure networks and it is shown to characterize the expected fluctuations in their response to external damage.