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Science 24 July 2009:
Vol. 325. no. 5939, pp. 412 - 413
DOI: 10.1126/science.1173299
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Perspective

Scale-Free Networks: A Decade and Beyond

Albert-László Barabási

For decades, we tacitly assumed that the components of such complex systems as the cell, the society, or the Internet are randomly wired together. In the past decade, an avalanche of research has shown that many real networks, independent of their age, function, and scope, converge to similar architectures, a universality that allowed researchers from different disciplines to embrace network theory as a common paradigm. The decade-old discovery of scale-free networks was one of those events that had helped catalyze the emergence of network science, a new research field with its distinct set of challenges and accomplishments.

Center for Complex Network Research, Department of Physics, Biology, and Computer Science, Northeastern University, Boston, MA 02115, USA. Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School and Center for Cancer Systems Biology, Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Boston, MA 02115, USA. E-mail: alb@neu.edu

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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)