A Node-Centric Approach for Community Detection in Dynamic Networks

Nowadays, social networks are recognized as significant sources of information exchange. Consequently, many organizations have chosen social networks as essential tools for marketing and brand management. Communities are essential structures that can enhance the performance of social networks by grouping nodes and analyzing the information derived from them. This subject becomes more important with the increase in information volume and the complexity of relationships in networks. The goal of community identification is to find subgraphs that are densely connected internally but loosely connected externally. While community detection has mostly been studied in static networks in the past, this paper focuses on dynamic networks and the influence of central nodes in forming communities. In the proposed algorithm, the network is captured through multiple snapshots. The initial snapshot calculates the influence of each node. Then, by selecting k nodes with higher influence, network communities are formed, and other nodes belong to the community with the most common edges. In the second step, after receiving the next snapshot, communities are updated. Then, k nodes with higher influence are selected, and their associated community is created if needed. If the previous community centers are not among the newly selected k nodes, the community is dissolved, and the nodes within it belong to other communities. Based on the results obtained, the proposed algorithm has managed to achieve better results in most cases compared to the compared algorithms, especially in terms of modularity metrics. The reason behind this success could be attributed to the utilization of influential nodes in community formation. Drawing from the outcomes attained, the suggested algorithm has effectively outperformed the contrasted algorithms in a majority of instances, particularly concerning metrics related to modularity. This accomplishment can potentially be ascribed to the incorporation of influential nodes during the process of community formation.