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Abstract

A decomposition of a chemical reaction network (CRN) is produced by partitioning its set of reactions. The partition induces networks, called subnetworks, that are "smaller" than the given CRN which, at this point, can be called parent network. A complex is called a common complex if it occurs in at least two subnetworks in a decomposition. A decomposition is said to be incidence independent if the image of the incidence map of the parent network is the direct sum of the images of the subnetworks' incidence maps. It has been recently discovered that the complex balanced equilibria of the parent network and its subnetworks are fundamentally connected in an incidence independent decomposition. In this paper, we utilized the set of common complexes and a developed criterion to investigate decomposition's incidence independence properties. A framework was also developed to analyze decomposition classes with similar structure and incidence independence properties. We identified decomposition classes that can be characterized by their sets of common complexes and studied their incidence independence. Some of these decomposition classes occur in some biological and chemical models. Finally, a sufficient condition was obtained for the complex balancing of some power law kinetic (PLK) systems with incidence independent and complex balanced decompositions. This condition led to a generalization of the Deficiency Zero Theorem for some PLK systems.