arXiv subjects

Kenneth S. Alexander

Publications and source records attributed to Kenneth S. Alexander.

24 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2006

Pinning of polymers and interfaces by random potentials

We consider a polymer, with monomer locations modeled by the trajectory of a Markov chain, in the presence of a potential that interacts with the polymer when it visits a particular site 0. Disorder is introduced by, for example, having the interaction vary from one monomer to another, as a constant $u$ plus i.i.d. mean-0 randomness. There is a critical value of $u$ above which the polymer is pinned, placing a positive fraction of its monomers at 0 with high probability. This critical point may differ for the quenched, annealed and deterministic cases. We show that self-averaging occurs, meaning that the quenched free energy and critical point are nonrandom, off a null set. We evaluate the critical point for a deterministic interaction ($u$ without added randomness) and establish our main result that the critical point in the quenched case is strictly smaller. We show that, for every fixed $u\in\mathbb{R}$, pinning occurs at sufficiently low temperatures. If the excursion length distribution has polynomial tails and the interaction does not have a finite exponential moment, then pinning occurs for all $u\in\mathbb{R}$ at arbitrary temperature. Our results apply to other mathematically similar situations as well, such as a directed polymer that interacts with a random potential located in a one-dimensional defect, or an interface in two dimensions interacting with a random potential along a wall.

math.PR↗

arXiv2002

Separated-occurrence inequalities for dependent percolation and Ising models

Separated-occurrence inequalities are variants for dependent lattice models of the van den Berg-Kesten inequality for independent models. They take the form $P(A \circ_r B) \leq (1 + ce^{-εr})P(A)P(B)$, where $A \circ_r B$ is the event that $A$ and $B$ occur at separation $r$ in a configuration $ω$, that is, there exist two random sets of bonds or sites separated by at least distance $r$, one set responsible for the occurrence of the event $A$ in $ω$, the other for the occurrence of $B$. We establish such inequalities for certain subcritical FK models, and for certain Ising models which are at supercritical temperature or have an external field, with $A$ and $B$ increasing or decreasing events.

math.PR↗

arXiv2002

Lower bounds for boundary roughness for droplets in Bernoulli percolation

We consider boundary roughness for the ``droplet'' created when supercritical two-dimensional Bernoulli percolation is conditioned to have an open dual circuit surrounding the origin and enclosing an area at least $l^2$, for large $l$. The maximum local roughness is the maximum inward deviation of the droplet boundary from the boundary of its own convex hull; we show that for large $l$ this maximum is at least of order $l^{1/3}(\log l)^{-2/3}$. This complements the upper bound of order $l^{1/3}(\log l)^{2/3}$ known for the average local roughness. The exponent 1/3 on $l$ here is in keeping with predictions from the physics literature for interfaces in two dimensions.

math.PR↗

arXiv2000

The spectral gap of the 2-D stochastic Ising model with nearly single-spin boundary conditions

We establish upper bounds for the spectral gap of the stochastic Ising model at low temperature in an N-by-N box, with boundary conditions which are ``plus'' except for small regions at the corners which are either free or ``minus.'' The spectral gap decreases exponentially in the size of the corner regions, when these regions are of size at least of order \log N. This means that removing as few as O(\log N) plus spins from the corners produces a spectral gap far smaller than the order N^{-2} gap believed to hold under the all-plus boundary condition. Our results are valid at all subcritical temperatures.

math.PR↗

arXiv2000

Cube-root boundary fluctuations for droplets in random cluster models

For a family of bond percolation models on Z^{2} that includes the Fortuin-Kasteleyn random cluster model, we consider properties of the ``droplet'' that results, in the percolating regime, from conditioning on the existence of an open dual circuit surrounding the origin and enclosing at least (or exactly) a given large area A. This droplet is a close surrogate for the one obtained by Dobrushin, Kotecký and Shlosman by conditioning the Ising model; it approximates an area-A Wulff shape. The local part of the deviation from the Wulff shape (the ``local roughness'') is the inward deviation of the droplet boundary from the boundary of its own convex hull; the remaining part of the deviation, that of the convex hull of the droplet from the Wulff shape, is inherently long-range. We show that the local roughness is described by at most the exponent 1/3 predicted by nonrigorous theory; this same prediction has been made for a wide class of interfaces in two dimensions. Specifically, the average of the local roughness over the droplet surface is shown to be O(l^{1/3}(\log l)^{2/3}) in probability, where l = \sqrt{A} is the linear scale of the droplet. We also bound the maximum of the local roughness over the droplet surface and bound the long-range part of the deviation from a Wulff shape, and we establish the absense of ``bottlenecks,'' which are a form of self-approach by the droplet boundary, down to scale \log l. Finally, if we condition instead on the event that the total area of all large droplets inside a finite box exceeds A, we show that with probability near 1 for large A, only a single large droplet is present.

math.PR↗

arXiv2000

The spectral gap of the 2-D stochastic Ising model with mixed boundary conditions

We establish upper bounds for the spectral gap of the stochastic Ising model at low temperatures in an n-by-n box with boundary conditions which are not purely plus or minus; specifically, we assume the magnitude of the sum of the boundary spins over each interval of length n in the boundary is bounded by δn, where δ< 1. We show that for any such boundary condition, when the temperature is sufficiently low (depending on δ), the spectral gap decreases exponentially in n.

math.PR↗