Vibrational resonance in a noise-induced structure -: art. no. 011106

We report on the effect of vibrational resonance in a spatially extended system of coupled noisy oscillators under the action of two periodic forces, a low-frequency one (signal) and a high-frequency one (carrier). Vibrational resonance manifests itself in the fact that for optimally selected values of high-frequency force amplitude, the response of the system to a low-frequency signal is optimal. This phenomenon is a synthesis of two effects, a noise-induced phase transition leading to bistability, and a conventional vibrational resonance, resulting in the optimization of signal processing. Numerical simulations, which demonstrate this effect for an extended system, can be understood by means of a zero-dimensional "effective" model. The behavior of this "effective" model is also confirmed by an experimental realization of an electronic circuit.