Clusters in randomly-coloured spatial networks

Abstract The behaviour and functioning of a variety of complex physical and biological systems depend on the spatial organisation of their constituent units, and the presence and formation of clusters of functionally similar or related individuals. Here we study the properties of clusters in spatially-embedded networks where nodes are coloured according to a given colouring process. This characterisation will allow us to use spatial networks with uniformly-coloured nodes as a null-model against which the importance, relevance, and significance of clusters of related units in a given real-world system can be assessed. We show that even a uniform and uncorrelated random colouring process can generate coloured clusters of substantial size and interesting shapes, which can be distinguished by using simple dynamical measures, like the average time needed for a random walk to escape from the cluster. We provide a mean-field approach to study the properties of those clusters in large two-dimensional lattices, and we show that the analytical treatment agrees very well with the numerical results. Finally, we will show how a dynamical approach can be used to explore some of the properties of such clusters, shedding light on a fresh and novel perspective for characterising spatial motifs.