Cooperative Scale-Free Networks despite the Presence of Defector Hubs Articles uri icon

published in

  • EPL  Journal

publication date

  • November 2009

start page

  • 38003

issue

  • 3

volume

  • 88

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

  • 0295-5075

Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)

  • 1286-4854

abstract

  • Recent results have shown that heterogeneous populations are better suited to
    support cooperation than homogeneous settings when the Prisoner's Dilemma drives
    the evolutionary dynamics of the system. The same occurs when the network growth
    is coevolving together with the evolutionary dynamics, which also gives rise to
    highly cooperative scale-free networks. In the latter case, however, the
    organization of cooperation is radically different with respect to the case in
    which the underlying network is static. In this paper we study the structure of
    cooperation in static networks grown together with evolutionary dynamics and
    show that the general belief that hubs can only be occupied by cooperators does
    not hold. Moreover, these scale-free networks support high levels of cooperation
    despite having defector hubs. Our results have several important implications
    for the explanation of cooperative behavior in scale-free networks and highlight
    the importance that the formation of complex systems have on its
    function.