Vulnerable connectivity caused by local communities in spatial networks

Abstract

Local communities by concentration of nodes connected with short links are widely observed in spatial networks. However, how such structure affects robustness of connectivity against malicious attacks remains unclear. This study investigates the impact of local communities on the robustness by modeling planar infrastructure networks whose node’s locations are based on statistical population data. Our research reveals that the robustness is weakened by strong local communities in spatial networks. These results highlight the potential of long-distance links in mitigating the negative effects of local community on the robustness.