About the Authors

Luís M. A. Bettencourt

lmbett@lanl.gov

Affiliations Theoretical Division and Center for Nonlinear Studies (CNLS), Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico, United States of America, Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, New Mexico, United States of America

José Lobo

Affiliation School of Human Evolution and Social Change and W. P. Carey School of Business, Arizona State University, Tempe, Arizona, United States of America

Deborah Strumsky

Affiliation Department of Geography and Earth Sciences, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, Charlotte, North Carolina, United States of America

Geoffrey B. West

Affiliations Theoretical Division and Center for Nonlinear Studies (CNLS), Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico, United States of America, Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, New Mexico, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: LMB JL GBW. Analyzed the data: LMB JL DS. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: LMB. Wrote the paper: LMB JL GBW.