Stationary distributions and condensation in autocatalytic reaction networks

Abstract

We investigate a broad family of stochastically modeled reaction networks by look- ing at their stationary distributions. Most known results on stationary distributions assume weak reversibility and zero deficiency. We first explicitly give product-form stationary distributions for a class of mostly non-weakly-reversible autocatalytic reaction networks of arbitrary deficiency. We provide examples of interest in statistical mechanics (inclusion process), life sciences, and robotics (collective decision making in ant and robot swarms). The product-form nature of the stationary distribution then enables the study of condensation in particle systems that are generalizations of the inclusion process.