What is a Boolean Network or NK model ?
Taking a collection (N) of logic gates (AND, OR, NOT etc.) each with K inputs and interconnecting them gives us a Boolean Network. Depending upon the number of inputs (K) to each gate we can generate a collection of possible logic functions that could be used. By allocating these to the nodes (N) at random we have a Random Boolean Network and this can be used to investigate whether organisation appears for different sets of parameters. Some possible logic functions are canalysing and it seems that this type of function is the most likely to generate self-organisation. This arrangement is also called biologically an NK model where N is seen as the number of genes (with 2 alleles each – the output states) and K denotes their inter-dependancies.
