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Oliver Riordan

Publications and source records attributed to Oliver Riordan.

57 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

The critical probability for random Voronoi percolation in the plane is 1/2

We study percolation in the following random environment: let $Z$ be a Poisson process of constant intensity in the plane, and form the Voronoi tessellation of the plane with respect to $Z$. Colour each Voronoi cell black with probability $p$, independently of the other cells. We show that the critical probability is 1/2. More precisely, if $p>1/2$ then the union of the black cells contains an infinite component with probability 1, while if $p<1/2$ then the distribution of the size of the component of black cells containing a given point decays exponentially. These results are analogous to Kesten's results for bond percolation in the square lattice. The result corresponding to Harris' Theorem for bond percolation in the square lattice is known: Zvavitch noted that one of the many proofs of this result can easily be adapted to the random Voronoi setting. For Kesten's results, none of the existing proofs seems to adapt. The methods used here also give a new and very simple proof of Kesten's Theorem for the square lattice; we hope they will be applicable in other contexts as well.

math.PR↗

A note on the Harris-Kesten Theorem

Recently, a short proof of the Harris-Kesten result that the critical probability for bond percolation in the planar square lattice is 1/2 was given, using a sharp threshold result of Friedgut and Kalai. Here we point out that a key part of this proof may be replaced by an argument of Russo from 1982, using his approximate zero-one law in place of the Friedgut-Kalai result. Russo's paper gave a new proof of the Harris-Kesten Theorem that seems to have received little attention.

math.PR↗

A short proof of the Harris-Kesten Theorem

We give a short proof of the fundamental result that the critical probability for bond percolation in the planar square lattice is equal to 1/2. The lower bound was proved by Harris, who showed in 1960 that percolation does not occur at $p=1/2$. The other, more difficult, bound was proved by Kesten, who showed in 1980 that percolation does occur for any $p>1/2$.

math.PR↗