Network motifs emerge from interconnections that favor stability
  Network motifs are overrepresented interconnection patterns found in real-world networks. What functional advantages may they offer for building complex systems? We show that most network motifs emerge from interconnections patterns that best exploit the intrinsic stability characteristics of individual nodes. This feature is observed at different scales in a network, from nodes to modules, suggesting an efficient mechanism to stably build complex systems. 
Marco Tulio Angulo, Yang-Yu Liu and Jean-Jacques Slotine
cs.SY physics.bio-ph physics.soc-ph