This paper considers state-dependent dynamics that mediate perception in the brain. In particular, it considers the formal basis of self-organized instabilities that enable perceptual transitions during Bayes-optimal perception. The basic phenomena we consider are perceptual transitions that lead to conscious ignition (Dehaene and Changeux, 2011) and how they depend on dynamical instabilities t...

We discuss recent results on a new analysis regarding models showing Self-Organized Criticality (SOC), and in particular on the OFC one. We show that Probability Density Functions (PDFs) for the avalanche size differences at different times have fat tails with a q-Gaussian shape. This behavior does not depend on the time interval adopted and it is also found when considering energy differences ...

Sub-2-nm (down to one-unit cell) uniform oxide nanocrystals and highly ordered superstructures were obtained in one step using oleylamine and oleic acid as capping and structure directing agents. The cooperative nature of the nanocrystal growth and assembly resulted in mesoscopic one-dimensional ribbon-like superstructures made of these ultrathin nanocrystals. The process reported here is gener...

We investigate a short-term memory formation mechanism in a nonlinear dynamical system with many degrees of freedom. The duration of these memories increases as the number of degrees of freedom in the system is increased, and some properties of the memory evolution display scaling behavior. Previously observed self-organization in the long time behavior of this model is shown to be a remnant of...

The study of the robust features of the magnetosphere is motivated both by new “whole system” approaches, and by the idea of “space climate” as opposed to “space weather”. We enumerate these features for the AE index, and discuss whether self-organised criticality (SOC) is the most natural explanation of the “stylised facts” so far known for AE. We identify and discuss some open questions, answ...

Preliminary results are presented which suggest that scaling and singularity characteristics of solar wind and ground based magnetic fluctuations appear to be a significant component in the solar wind magnetosphere interaction processes. Of key importance is the intermittence of the ”magnetic turbulence” as seen in ground based and solar wind magnetic data. The methods used in this paper (estim...

This paper presents a solution to the problem of self-organized aggregation of embodied robots that requires no arithmetic computation. The robots have no memory and are equipped with one binary sensor, which informs them whether or not there is another robot in their line of sight. It is proven that the sensor needs to have a sufficiently long range; otherwise aggregation cannot be guaranteed,...

In this position paper we present a concept to automatically simplify computational processes in large-scale self-organizing multi-agent simulations. The fundamental idea is that groups of agents that exhibit predictable interaction patterns are temporarily subsumed by higher order agents with behaviours of lower computational costs. In this manner, hierarchies of meta-agents automatically abst...

We present a pedagogical introduction to self-organized criticality (SOC), unraveling its connections with nonequilibrium phase transitions. There are several paths from a conventional critical point to SOC. They begin with an absorbing-state phase transition (directed percolation is a familiar example), and impose supervision or driving on the system; two commonly used methods are extremal dyn...

In this paper I ask questions about the evolution of self-organized activity cycles that are found in some ant colonies. I use a computer model that generates periodic activity patterns in interacting subunits and explore the parameters of this model using a genetic algorithm in which selecting on one aspect of the system produces the distinctive self-organized pattern. The general point that I...