Communication Network Role Analysis Based on Weighted Directed Topological Potential

Abstract

Role analysis is a very important branch of complex network research, which tries to identify the node types with similar structures or functions. Inspired by the midfield in physics, and by extending and further expanding the concept of topological potential, a role identification and analysis method based on weighted directed topological potentials in connection with node “mass” (i.e. node own attribute) was introduced in this paper. This proposed method takes into consideration both the node own attributes and the network topological attributes, and identifies node roles by the difference in node topological potential. Its effectiveness was well verified by the experimental results on an IP communication network.