With , the equilibria satisfy
Besides , the two positive equilibria are
where . Since
the nonzero equilibrium relation gives
The fixed point stability for an autonomous differential equation therefore shows that and are stable, while is unstable. The graph of starts at zero with negative slope, crosses upward at , crosses downward at , and tends to as .
For a constant input , write the equilibrium equation as
The low stable equilibrium and the intervening unstable equilibrium coalesce in a saddle-node bifurcation. More precisely, let be the first positive solution of
and define
Equivalently, and , with on the low-concentration branch. If , that branch no longer exists. Holding the input long enough carries the trajectory into the basin of attraction of the high state. When the input returns to zero, the concentration converges to
This is the saturating autocatalytic switch.
For , the threshold occurs at , so
The approximate double-root conditions are
Thus and
Hence the constant in is , as recorded by the strong-autocatalysis switching threshold.
Strong-autocatalysis switching threshold Created 2026-09-24 Updated 2026-09-24
For , the low-concentration saddle node of the saturating autocatalytic switch has