Spectral Efficiency Centrality (SEC), a temporal spectral centrality framework that quantifies node importance by evaluating the change in spectral radius caused by node removal across temporal snapshots, and ASEC, an efficient approximation based on Perron-Frobenius theory and first-order eigenvalue perturbation that offers a computationally efficient solution for large-scale temporal networks.
Abstract
Centrality measures play a vital role in identifying influential nodes in evolving networks. While existing temporal centrality measures primarily rely on local structural properties or temporal paths, spectral node-removal approaches have been largely limited to static networks. To bridge this gap, we propose Spectral Efficiency Centrality (SEC), a temporal spectral centrality framework that quantifies node importance by evaluating the change in spectral radius caused by node removal across temporal snapshots. By capturing the global structural influence of nodes throughout network evolution, SEC identifies nodes that are critical for preserving the structural connectivity and efficiency of temporal networks. To improve computational scalability, we further develop an efficient approximation, ASEC, based on Perron-Frobenius theory and first-order eigenvalue perturbation. ASEC requires only the leading eigenpair and avoids repeated eigendecomposition, making it suitable for large temporal networks. Extensive experiments on multiple real-world temporal datasets demonstrate that SEC and ASEC outperform existing baseline centrality measures in identifying influential nodes under SI, SIS, and IC diffusion models. Statistical significance and robustness analyses further confirm their effectiveness, while ASEC offers a computationally efficient solution for large-scale temporal networks.
Identifying influential nodes in complex networks is a fundamental problem with applications in information diffusion, epidemic control, infrastructure robustness, and biological systems. Traditional approaches rely on structural centrality measures, such as degree, betweenness, closeness, and PageRank, which quantify node importance based on network connectivity. However, these measures do not explicitly account for diffusion dynamics and the structural impact of node removal, where both spreading capability and network resilience play a critical role. In this paper, we propose a unified framework that jointly captures diffusion-based influence and structural resilience. We first introduce an SIR-based centrality in which node influence is defined by its spreading capability, while resilience is quantified by measuring the change in total network diffusion after node removal. To address the computational cost of this formulation, we propose the Resilient-Influential Node (RIN) centrality, which efficiently approximates the unified objective by combining classical centrality measures with a Laplacian-based structural adjustment. Experimental results on multiple real-world networks, using SIR-based rankings as ground truth, show that the proposed RIN framework provides a consistent and principled characterization of influential and resilient nodes across diverse network structures.
Afra Kurudirek, Ibrahim Filik, Sravan Sakhamuri et al.· 2026 International Conferenc...· 0 citations
Time-evolving networks, or temporal networks, play a crucial role in modeling dynamic interactions across various domains, including biology, social sciences, and information technology. Unlike static networks, these systems undergo continuous changes in topology and edge weights, influencing processes such as information flow, transportation efficiency, and neural activity. Understanding and controlling these networks are essential for predicting future behavior and optimizing dynamic processes. This work focuses on the problem of dynamic centrality, a measure of node importance in time-dependent networks. Specifically, we address how to steer network centrality to a desired state by making minimal modifications to the network structure. This problem is formulated as an optimal control problem for an ordinary differential equation, either matrix- or vector-based, where the control acts on network edges. The proposed framework generalizes centrality control problems studied in static networks and leverages the Pontryagin Maximum Principle for efficient solutions. For large-scale problems, the required matrix-function actions are approximated by Krylov-type techniques, avoiding the explicit formation of dense matrix functions. Numerical experiments on synthetic and real temporal networks show that the proposed framework can effectively steer receive centrality under prescribed control constraints.
Experimental results in seven complex networks of the real world show that the proposed hybrid centrality called k-core neighborhood density (KND) remarkably balances rank distribution and accuracy, and the identified influential nodes have a superior ability to spread their influence over a wide area of a network.
This work proposes two scalable greedy algorithms based on gradient-guided edge selection that efficiently approximate marginal gains and prune the candidate edge set and achieves optimization performance comparable to exact greedy strategies while substantially reducing computational time.
Runze Zhang, Gengyu Wang, Zhongzhi Zhang· Proceedings of the 32nd ACM...· 0 citations
WKDH fuses local structural attributes with global structural attributes via a multiplicative weighted synergy model, simultaneously capturing local connection “quantity,” local connection “quality,” and global core-layer position, and achieves linear computational complexity of O(m).
Na Zhao, Chaozhou Dai, Guo-Lin Yang et al.· Entropy· 0 citations
The Influence-Spreading Model (ISM) introduces three probabilistic centrality measures: out-centrality, in-centrality, and ISM betweenness centrality. Out-centrality measures the average probability that a node influences others, while in-centrality measures the average probability that others influence a node. ISM betweenness centrality measures the change in total probabilistic influence when a node is removed. These measures depend on edge transmission probabilities and allow walks up to a specified maximum length. We compare the ISM centrality measures to commonly used weighted variants of out-degree, in-degree, closeness, shortest-path betweenness, and Katz centrality in directed, weighted networks using four real-world online social networks and nine synthetic networks generated by Erd\H{o}s-R\'enyi, navigable small-world, and directed scale-free models. For the synthetic networks, the edge probabilities are drawn from three beta distributions. We evaluate the similarity in centrality values and their ranking using Pearson correlation and Spearman's rank correlation coefficients. Results show strong correlations between the ISM out-centrality and weighted out-degree and outward Katz centrality, particularly for low edge probabilities. Conversely, relationships between the ISM in-centrality and other measures vary with network topology, sometimes yielding negative correlations. Correlations between the ISM betweenness and the shortest-path betweenness are also topology-dependent and weaken as alternative influence paths become more relevant. Overall, standard centrality measures can approximate the influence of broadcasting influence but often miss the nuances of receiving influence and probabilistic intermediary roles.