Self-organised criticality in the evolution of the agent-based huddling model.

Abstract

<p>Fits to a power law model were obtained from the distribution of <i>G</i>_min in the evolution of the agent-based model. The exponent of the power law fit is stable across a wide range of ambient temperatures below <i>T</i>_<i>P</i> = 37°C. For evolution at <i>T</i>_<i>A</i> ≤ 20°C, the exponent is stable at −2.79 ± 0.15. The robustness of the power law fit across a wide range of ambient temperatures is strong evidence of self-organised criticality. The correspondence with <a href="http://www.ploscompbiol.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pcbi.1005378#pcbi.1005378.g004" target="_blank">Fig 4</a> confirms that self-organised criticality is a feature of both the thermodynamic and agent-based descriptions of rodent huddling, when subjected to evolutionary pressure in which the costs associated with competitive and cooperative interactions between individuals are balanced.</p