Qualitative Analysis of Critical Transitions in Complex Disease Propagation from a Dynamical Systems Perspective

Abstract

Considerable evidence suggests that in complex diseases the deteriorations are often abrupt, and can be viewed as a bifurcation or a critical transition from one asymptotically stable equilibrium to another one at a tipping point. Here, we propose some new ideas to detect early-warning signals of such critical transitions from the perspective of qualitative theory of ordinary differential equations. Specifically, we theoretically derive three indicators that serve as a general early-warning signal indicating an imminent bifurcation or sudden deterioration before the critical transition occurs. Then, we verify our theoretical results by numerical simulations for three examples. Our work forms a starting point to motivate new mathematical insights into predictability for critical transitions of dynamical systems from a new perspective.