Biological competition: Decision rules, pattern formation, and oscillations

Author(s): Grossberg, S. |

Year: 1980

Citation: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 77, 2338-2342

Abstract: Competition solves a universal problem about pattern processing by cellular systems. Competition allows cells to automatically retune their sensitivity to avoid noise and saturation effects. All competitive systems induce decision schemes that permit them to be classified. Systems are identified that achieve global pattern formation, or decision-making, no matter how their parameters are chosen. Oscillations can occur due to contradictions in a systelJll decision scheme.T he pattern formation and oscillation results are extreme examples of a complementarity principle that seems to hold for competitive systems. Nonlinear competitive systems can sometimes appear, to a macroscopic observer, to have linear and cooperative properties, although the two types of systems are not equivalent. This observation is relevant to theories about the evolutionary transition from competitive to cooperative behavior.

Topics: Biological Learning, Models: Other,

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