Entropy-production-driven oscillators in simple nonequilibrium networks.

Abstract

The development of tractable nonequilibrium simulation methods represents a bottleneck for efforts to describe the functional dynamics that occur within living cells. We here employ a nonequilibrium approach called the λ ensemble to characterize the dissipative dynamics of a simple Markovian network driven by an external potential. In the highly dissipative regime brought about by the λ bias, we observe a dynamical structure characteristic of cellular architectures: The entropy production drives a damped oscillator over state populations in the network. We illustrate the properties of such oscillations in weakly and strongly driven regimes, and we discuss how control structures associated with the "dynamical phase transition" in the system can be related to switches and oscillators in cellular dynamics.