This book is devoted to an analysis of general weakly connected neural networks (WCNNs) that can be written in the form (0.1) m Here, each Xi E IR is a vector that summarizes all physiological attributes of the ith neuron, n is the number of neurons, Ii describes the dynam- ics of the ith neuron, and gi describes the interactions between neurons. The small parameter indicates the strength of connections between the neurons. Weakly connected systems have attracted much attention since the sec- ond half of seventeenth century, when Christian Huygens noticed that a pair of pendulum clocks...

Beginning with realistic mathematical or verbal models of physical or biological phenomena, the author derives tractable models for further mathematical analysis or computer simulations. For the most part, derivations are based on perturbation methods, and the majority of the text is devoted to careful derivations of implicit function theorems, the method of averaging, and quasi-static state approximation methods. The duality between stability and perturbation is developed and used, relying heavily on the concept of stability under persistent disturbances. Relevant topics about linear...