On local bifurcations in neural field models with transmission delays (Q1944633)

The aim of the article is to show how the general theory of delay equations can be successfully used to analyze the stability and bifurcation of equilibrium solutions to the system of integro-differential equations \[ \frac{\partial V_i}{\partial t}(t,\mathbf{r})\equiv -\alpha_iV_i (t,\mathbf{r})+\sum_{j=1}^p\int_{\Omega}J_{ij}(\mathbf{r},\mathbf{r}')S_j(V_i (t-\tau_{ij}(\mathbf{r},\mathbf{r}'),\mathbf{r}'))d\mathbf{r}', \quad i=1,\dots, p \tag{1} \] describing the dynamics of \(p\) populations of neurons, \(p\geq 1\), which occupy fixed positions in a bounded connected open region \(\Omega \subset \mathbb{R}^n\). Here \(V_i(t,\mathbf{r})\) is the membrane potential averaged over neurons in the \(i\)-th populations positioned at \(\mathbf{r}\in \Omega\), the propagation delays \(\tau_{ij}(\mathbf{r},\mathbf{r}')\) measure the time for a signal sent by \(a_j\)-type neuron located at position \(\mathbf{r}'\) to reach a \(i\)-th type neuron located at position \(\mathbf{r}\). The main goal for the near future of the authors is to develop tools for numerical bifurcation analysis for the class of equations studied in this article.