Desynchrony induced by higher-order interactions in triplex metapopulations

In a predator-prey metapopulation, two traits are adversely related: synchronization and persistence. A decrease in synchrony apparently leads to an increase in persistence and, therefore, necessitates the study of desynchrony in a metapopulation. In this article, we study predator-prey patches that communicate with one another while being interconnected through distinct dispersal structures in the layers of a three-layer multiplex network. We investigate the synchronization phenomenon among the patches of the outer layers by introducing higher-order interactions (specifically three-body interactions) in the middle layer. We observe a decrease in the synchronous behavior or, alternatively, an increase in desynchrony due to the inclusion of group interactions among the patches of the middle layer. The advancement of desynchrony becomes more prominent with increasing strength and numbers of three-way interactions in the middle layer. We analytically validate our numerical results by performing a stability analysis of the referred synchronous solution using the master stability function approach. Additionally, we verify our findings by taking into account two distinct predator-prey models and dispersal topologies, which ultimately supports that the findings are generalizable across various models and dispersal structures.