Dynamical robustness of collective neuronal activity upon targeted damage in interdependent networks

In the last decades, the availability of data about the structure of social, technological and biological systems has provided important insights on the mechanisms governing their correct functioning and robustness. These mechanisms are grounded on the complex backbone of interactions among the constituents of the system, which include both topological and dynamical aspects. Here, we analyze interdependent networks composed of two layers of interacting neuronal units and explore their robustness when these synthetic cultures are subjected to damage in the form of either targeted attack or failure. Our results show that the functionality of these networks does not decrease monotonically with damage but, on the contrary, they are able to increase their level of activity when the experienced damage is sufficiently strong.