Non-normality, reactivity, and intrinsic stochasticity in neural dynamics: a non-equilibrium potential approach Muñoz Martínez, Miguel Ángel Burioni, Raffaella Villegas, Pablo Di Santo, Serena Intrinsic stochasticity can induce highly non-trivial effects on dynamical systems, such as stochastic resonance, noise induced bistability, and noise-induced oscillations, to name but a few. Here we revisit a mechanism-first investigated in the context of neuroscience-by which relatively small intrinsic (demographic) fluctuations can lead to the emergence of avalanching behavior in systems that are deterministically characterized by a single stable fixed point (up state). The anomalously large response of such systems to stochasticity stems from (or is strongly associated with) the existence of a 'non-normal' stability matrix at the deterministic fixed point, which may induce the system to be 'reactive'. By employing a number of analytical and computational approaches, we further investigate this mechanism and explore the interplay between non-normality and intrinsic stochasticity. In particular, we conclude that the resulting dynamics of this type of systems cannot be simply derived from a scalar potential but, additionally, one needs to consider a curl flux which describes the essential non-equilibrium nature of this type of noisy non-normal systems. Moreover, we shed further light on the origin of the phenomenon, introduce the novel concept of 'non-linear reactivity', and rationalize the observed values of avalanche exponents. 2021-10-04T11:53:12Z 2021-10-04T11:53:12Z 2018-07 info:eu-repo/semantics/article Muñoz, MA; Burioni, R; Villegas, P; di Santo, Serena. Non-normality, reactivity, and intrinsic stochasticity in neural dynamics: a non-equilibrium potential approach http://hdl.handle.net/10481/70626 10.1088/1742-5468/aacda3 eng http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/es/ info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess Atribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 3.0 España