Inducing amplitude death via discontinuous coupling

To explore the conditions ensuring amplitude death is always a topic of research for understanding the nature of real systems. However, the previous studies mainly focus on the coupling, that is, continuous or time-invariant. Here we would bring the discontinuous (on–off) coupling to the coupled nonidentical Stuart–Landau oscillators and Rossler oscillators, respectively. We show that the domains of amplitude death can be effectively enlarged along two directions of coupling strength and parameter mismatch. Specifically, the range of coupling strength is extended infinitely for the appropriate on–off rate and on–off period although it usually is considered to be bounded to induce the amplitude death for continuous coupling. Moreover, our findings are of great importance and have many potential applications for the research of neuroscience and biology where the interaction between the neurons or cells is usually intermittent or discontinuous.