Probabilistic approach to the Bak-Sneppen model

We study here the Bak-Sneppen model, a prototype model for the study of self-organized criticality. In this model several species interact and undergo extinction with a power-law distribution of activity bursts. Species are defined through their "fitness" whose distribution in the system is uniform above a certain threshold. Run time statistics is introduced for the analysis of the dynamics in order to explain the peculiar properties of the model. This approach based on conditional probability theory, takes into account the correlations due to memory effects. In this way, we may compute analytically the value of the fitness threshold with the desired precision. This represents a substantial improvement with respect to the traditional mean field approach. © 2002 The American Physical Society.