  Locally decreasing the impulse transmitted by periodic pulses is shown to be
a reliable method of taming chaos in starlike networks of dissipative nonlinear
oscillators, leading to both synchronous periodic states and equilibria
(oscillation death). Specifically, the paradigmatic model of damped kicked
rotators is studied in which it is assumed that when the rotators are driven
synchronously, i.e., all driving pulses transmit the same impulse, the networks
display chaotic dynamics. It is found that the taming effect of decreasing the
impulse transmitted by the pulses acting on particular nodes strongly depends
on their number and degree of connectivity. A theoretical analysis is given
explaining the basic physical mechanism as well as the main features of the
chaos-control scenario.
