Symmetry and Self-Organization in Complex Systems

Abstract

We show that, in contrast to classical random graph models, many real-world complex systems -- including a variety of biological regulatory networks and technological networks such as the internet -- spontaneously self-organize to a richly symmetric state. We consider the organizational origins of symmetry and find that growth with preferential attachment confers symmetry in highly branched networks. We deconstruct the automorphism group of some real-world networks and find that some, but not all, real-world symmetry can be accounted for by branching. We also uncover an intriguing correspondence between the size of the automorphism group of growing random trees and the random Fibonacci sequences.