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Kuramoto model with additional nearest-neighbor interactions: Existence of a nonequilibrium tricritical point

A paradigmatic framework to study the phenomenon of spontaneous collective synchronization is provided by the Kuramoto model comprising a large collection of limit-cycle oscillators of distributed frequencies that are globally coupled through the sine of their phase differences. We study here a variation of the model by including nearest-neighbor interactions on a one-dimensional lattice. While the mean-field interaction resulting from the global coupling favors global synchrony, the nearest-neighbor interaction may have cooperative or competitive effects depending on the sign and the magnitude of the nearest-neighbor coupling. For unimodal and symmetric frequency distributions, we demonstrate that as a result, the model in the stationary state exhibits in contrast to the usual Kuramoto model both continuous and first-order transitions between synchronized and incoherent phases, with the transition lines meeting at a tricritical point. Our results are based on numerical integration of the dynamics as well as an approximate theory involving appropriate averaging of fluctuations in the stationary state.