Information theoretical methods for complex network structure reconstruction

*Correspondence: [email protected] 1Computational Genomics Department, National Institute of Genomic Medicine, Mexico City, México 2Complexity in Systems Biology, Center for Complexity Sciences, National Autonomous University of México, Mexico City, Mexico Full list of author information is available at the end of the article Abstract Purpose: Complex networks seem to be ubiquitous objects in contemporary research, both in the natural and social sciences. An important area of research regarding the applicability and modeling of graphtheoretical-oriented approaches to complex systems, is the probabilistic inference of such networks. There exist different methods and algorithms designed for this purpose, most of them are inspired in statistical mechanics and rely on information theoretical grounds. An important shortcoming for most of these methods, when it comes to disentangle the actual structure of complex networks, is that they fail to distinguish between direct and indirect interactions. Here, we suggest a method to discover and assess for such indirect interactions within the framework of information theory. Methods: Information-theoretical measures (in particular, Mutual Information) are applied for the probabilistic inference of complex networks. Data Processing Inequality is used to find and assess for direct and indirect interactions impact in complex networks.