Equal-strength power-law mutual repression ($f(y)=\lambda (1+y{)}^{-n},g(x)=\lambda (1+x{)}^{-m}$)

For positive $m,n$, this mutual repression system can display bistability for some $\lambda$ exactly when both $m>1$ and $n>1$. If either exponent is at most one, it has a unique stable equilibrium for every $\lambda$. To prove the less obvious case $m\le 1<n$, put $a=x/(1+x)$ and $b=y/(1+y)$ at equilibrium. Equality of the two expressions for $\lambda$ gives $a\le b(1-b{)}^{n-1}$. The loop gain is then bounded by $mn{b}^2(1-b{)}^{n-1}$, whose maximum is $4mn(n-1{)}^{n-1}/(n+1{)}^{n+1}<1$. Swap the two components for the other case. If both exponents exceed one, sufficiently large $\lambda$ yields two stable equilibria with $(x,y)\sim (\lambda ,{\lambda }^{1-m})$ and $(x,y)\sim ({\lambda }^{1-n},\lambda )$. The weaker condition $mn\le 1$ is sufficient to exclude multistability, but does not exhaust all exclusions when the same production prefactor is imposed.

// Target: mathematical-biology.bigb