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. 2015 Nov 6;12(112):20150712. doi: 10.1098/rsif.2015.0712

Table 1.

Examples of coupled subsystems in which each subsystem undergoes sudden changes in the form of saddle-node bifurcations, in models cited in the column ‘regime shift'. The column ‘scalar quantity' describes the state of the subsystem, and it corresponds to x(t), y(t) or z(t) in the model in §2. Citations in the fourth column include empirical studies and mathematical models.

discipline regime shift scalar quantity examples of couplings among subsystems
ecology extinction due to over-harvesting [15,16] population diffusion among patches of an ecosystem [2,4]
economics boom and bust in the Kaldor model of business cycles [17] output (gross domestic product) investment between sectors [18], trade [13] and capital flows [19] between countries can synchronize business cycles
economics currency crisis (devaluation or, for a peg, loss of reserves) [20] currency value changes in macroeconomic fundamentals, sentiment, perceived riskiness, risk aversion [20] and trade [21]
economics poverty trap [22,23] well-being (capital, capabilities) fractal poverty traps [9]
finance asset price declines [24,25] asset price asset-to-asset contagion (a bank with a declining asset sells other assets) [26]
finance probability of bank failure [27] probability of bank failure worry about institutions' creditworthiness spreads contagiously [28]
technology adoption sudden change to new platform [13,29] difference between supply and demand of the new platform movement of people among distinct markets [14]
political uprisings, revolts [30,31] number of protestors communication spreads inspiration, successful strategies across borders [11,12,32,33]; raising importance of identity [31] that span borders [34]
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