Figure 4.

The convergence to the spurious state is not gradual and is punctuated by sudden changes in the network state separated by long periods of relative stability. The results are presented for the convergence to the mixture of 50% Plane and 50% Key, as depicted in Fig. 3. (A) The Lyapunov function, which plays the role of energy in this network, always decreases over time. The decrease is not uniform and consists in slow decay punctuated by fast drops (horizontal bar). (B) The change in the gene activity vector, $\Delta x$ (defined in Methods), displays spikes that coincide with the drops in the Lyapunov function.