Studying the Topology of Transportation Systems through Complex Networks: Handle with Care

Figure 2

An example of a network attack. The process starts with a target network (a), where we want to attack two nodes. In (b) we show an optimal disruption when being allowed to disrupt two nodes. The choice of and reduces the GC size from to . In (c) we show a disruption induced by node failures of and . In (d) we show a disruption induced by node failures of and ; the majority of the network is still functional, as the GC size is reduced from 13 to 11 only.

(a) Original network (GC size=13)

(b) Optimal most-hazardous disruption (GC size=5)

(c) Normal disruption (GC size=7)

(d) Potentially harmless disruption (GC size=11)