Patterns of synchronization, broken symmetries, and attractor switching in a ring of nanoelectromechanical oscillators*

Here we study both theoretically and experimentally an 8-node ring network of coupled nanoelectromechanical (NEMS) oscillators. These are phase and amplitude oscillators driven with a Duffing-type nonlinearity. In addition to typical phase-locked states, we observe synchronized states which break the symmetry of the oscillator ring, including states that have not been discovered previously. We demonstrate that with individual node and edge control within our system, we are able to perturb these states to unveil the nature of these broken symmetries. Finally, we observe the real-time dynamics of of all phase and amplitude degrees-of-freedom and the switching behavior between different steady-state patterns of synchronization. Our experiment demonstrates the promise of coupled NEMS oscillator systems to study open questions in the dynamics and control of complex networks.