Asymptotic periodicity in networks of degrade-and-fire oscillators

•We give mathematical results on dynamics of networks of degrade-and-fire oscillators.•The model eludes standard assumptions on evolution equations, such as monotonicity.•We prove convergence to periodic behavior under mild assumption on firing sequence.

Networks of coupled degrade-and-fire (DF) oscillators are simple dynamical models of assemblies of interacting self-repressing genes. For mean-field interactions, which most mathematical studies have assumed so far, every trajectory must approach a periodic orbit. Moreover, asymptotic cluster distributions can be computed explicitly in terms of coupling intensity, and a massive collection of distributions collapses when this intensity passes a threshold. Here, we show that most of these dynamical features persist for an arbitrary coupling topology. In particular, we prove that, in any system of DF oscillators for which in and out coupling weights balance, trajectories with reasonable firing sequences must be asymptotically periodic, and periodic orbits are uniquely determined by their firing sequence. In addition to these structural results, illustrative examples are presented, for which the dynamics can be entirely described.