Chaos and cooperation in nonlinear pictorial feedback systems 1: Experiments

Abstract

We study the behavior of pictures which circulate through a feedback loop containing a sequence of nonlinearity and convolution. Experiments and theoretical investigations show that deterministic chaos may appear as well as cooperative effects. The latter manifest themselves in the formation of stable patterns with long-range spatial correlation. These patterns show structural similarity to the initial picture. Furthermore, they are stable even in a system with noise; in other words, they show autoassociative properties.