arXiv subjects

Vicenç Méndez

Publications and source records attributed to Vicenç Méndez.

35 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2019

Anomalous diffusion in random-walks with memory-induced relocations

In this minireview we present the main results regarding the transport properties of stochastic movement with relocations to known positions. To do so, we formulate the problem in a general manner to see several cases extensively studied during the last years as particular situations within a framework of random walks with memory. We focus on (i) stochastic motion with resets to its initial position followed by a waiting period, and (ii) diffusive motion with memory-driven relocations to previously visited positions. For both of them we show how the overall transport regime may be actively modified by the details of the relocation mechanism.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2019

Recurrence time correlations in random walks with preferential relocation to visited places

Random walks with memory typically involve rules where a preference for either revisiting or avoiding those sites visited in the past are introduced somehow. Such effects have a direct consequence on the statistics of first-passage and subsequent recurrence times through a site; typically, a preference for revisiting sites is expected to result in a positive correlation between consecutive recurrence times. Here we derive a continuous-time generalization of the random walk model with preferential relocation to visited sites proposed in [Phys. Rev. Lett. 112, 240601] to explore this effect, together with the main transport properties induced by the long-range memory. Despite the highly non-Markovian character of the process, our analytical treatment allows us to (i) observe the existence of an asymptotic logarithmic (ultraslow) growth for the mean square displacement, in accordance to the results found for the original discrete-time model, and (ii) confirm the existence of positive correlations between first-passage and subsequent recurrence times. This analysis is completed with a comprehensive numerical study which reveals, among other results, that these correlations between first-passage and recurrence times also exhibit clear signatures of the ultraslow dynamics present in the process.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2019

Transport properties and first arrival statistics of random searches with stochastic reset times

Stochastic resets have lately emerged as a mechanism able to generate finite equilibrium mean square displacement (MSD) when they are applied to diffusive motion. Furthermore, walkers with an infinite mean first arrival time (MFAT) to a given position $x$, may reach it in a finite time when they reset their position. In this work we study these emerging phenomena from a unified perspective. On one hand we study the existence of a finite equilibrium MSD when resets are applied to random motion with $\langle x^2(t)\rangle _m\sim t^p$ for $0<p\leq2$. For exponentially distributed reset times, a compact formula is derived for the equilibrium MSD of the overall process in terms of the mean reset time and the motion MSD. On the other hand, we also test the robustness of the finiteness of the MFAT for different motion dynamics which are subject to stochastic resets. Finally, we study a biased Brownian oscillator with resets with the general formulas derived in this work, finding its equilibrium first moment and MSD, and its MFAT to the minimum of the harmonic potential.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2019

Two-particle quantum correlations in stochastically-coupled networks

Quantum walks in dynamically-disordered networks have become an invaluable tool for understanding the physics of open quantum systems. In this work, we introduce a novel approach to describe the dynamics of indistinguishable particles in noisy quantum networks. By making use of stochastic calculus, we derive a master equation for the propagation of two non-interacting correlated particles in tight-binding networks affected by off-diagonal dynamical disorder. We show that the presence of noise in the couplings of a quantum network creates a pure-dephasing-like process that destroys all coherences in the single-particle Hilbert subspace. Remarkably, we find that when two or more correlated particles propagate in the network, coherences accounting for particle indistinguishability are robust against the impact of noise, thus showing that it is possible, in principle, to find specific conditions for which many indistinguishable particles can traverse dynamically-disordered systems without losing their ability to interfere. These results shed light on the role of particle indistinguishability in the preservation of quantum coherence in dynamically-disordered quantum networks.

quant-ph↗

arXiv2019

Demographic stochasticity and extinction in populations with Allee effect

We study simple stochastic scenarios, based on birth-and-death Markovian processes, that describe populations with Allee effect, to account for the role of demographic stochasticity. In the mean-field deterministic limit we recover well-known deterministic evolution equations widely employed in population ecology. The mean-time to extinction is in general obtained by the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin (WKB) approximation for populations with strong and weak Allee effects. An exact solution for the mean time to extinction can be found via a recursive equation for special cases of the stochastic dynamics. We study the conditions for the validity of the WKB solution and analyze the boundary between the weak and strong Allee effect by comparing exact solutions with numerical simulations.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2018

Stochastic processes subject to a reset-and-residence mechanism: transport properties and first arrival statistics

In this work we consider a stochastic movement process with random resets to the origin followed by a random residence time there before the walker restarts its motion. First, we study the transport properties of the walker, we derive an expression for the mean square displacement of the overall process and study its dependence with the statistical properties of the resets, the residence and the movement. From this general formula, we see that the inclusion of the residence after the resets is able to induce super-diffusive to sub-diffusive (or diffusive) regimes and it can also make a sub-diffusive walker reach a constant MSD or even collapse. Second, we study how the reset-and-residence mechanism affects the first arrival time of different search processes to a given position, showing that the long time behavior of the reset and residence time distributions determine the existence of the mean first arrival time.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2017

Langevin dynamics for ramified structures

We propose a generalized Langevin formalism to describe transport in combs and similar ramified structures. Our approach consists of a Langevin equation without drift for the motion along the backbone. The motion along the secondary branches may be described either by a Langevin equation or by other types of random processes. The mean square displacement (MSD) along the backbone characterizes the transport through the ramified structure. We derive a general analytical expression for this observable in terms of the probability distribution function of the motion along the secondary branches. We apply our result to various types of motion along the secondary branches of finite or infinite length, such as subdiffusion, superdiffusion, and Langevin dynamics with colored Gaussian noise and with non-Gaussian white noise. Monte Carlo simulations show excellent agreement with the analytical results. The MSD for the case of Gaussian noise is shown to be independent of the noise color. We conclude by generalizing our analytical expression for the MSD to the case where each secondary branch is $n$ dimensional.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2016

Lévy processes on a generalized fractal comb

Comb geometry, constituted of a backbone and fingers, is one of the most simple paradigm of a two dimensional structure, where anomalous diffusion can be realized in the framework of Markov processes. However, the intrinsic properties of the structure can destroy this Markovian transport. These effects can be described by the memory and spatial kernels. In particular, the fractal structure of the fingers, which is controlled by the spatial kernel in both the real and the Fourier spaces, leads to the Lévy processes (Lévy flights) and superdiffusion. This generalization of the fractional diffusion is described by the Riesz space fractional derivative. In the framework of this generalized fractal comb model, Lévy processes are considered, and exact solutions for the probability distribution functions are obtained in terms of the Fox $H$-function for a variety of the memory kernels, and the rate of the superdiffusive spreading is studied by calculating the fractional moments. For a special form of the memory kernels, we also observed a competition between long rests and long jumps. Finally, we considered the fractional structure of the fingers controlled by a Weierstrass function, which leads to the power-law kernel in the Fourier space. It is a special case, when the second moment exists for superdiffusion in this competition between long rests and long jumps.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2016

Proliferating Lévy Walkers and Front Propagation

We develop non-linear integro-differential kinetic equations for proliferating Lévy walkers with birth and death processes. A hyperbolic scaling is applied directly to the general equations to get the Hamilton-Jacobi equations that will allow to determine the rate of front propagation. We found the conditions for switching, birth and death rates under which the propagation velocity reaches the maximum value, i.e. the walker's speed. In the strong anomalous case the death rate was found to influence the velocity of propagation to fall below the walker's maximum speed.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2015

Phase transitions in optimal search times: how random walkers should combine resetting and flight scales

Recent works have explored the properties of Lévy flights with resetting in one-dimensional domains and have reported the existence of phase transitions in the phase space of parameters which minimizes the Mean First Passage Time (MFPT) through the origin [Phys. Rev. Lett. 113, 220602 (2014)]. Here we show how actually an interesting dynamics, including also phase transitions for the minimization of the MFPT, can also be obtained without invoking the use of Lévy statistics but for the simpler case of random walks with exponentially distributed flights of constant speed. We explore this dynamics both in the case of finite and infinite domains, and for different implementations of the resetting mechanism to show that different ways to introduce resetting consistently lead to a quite similar dynamics. The use of exponential flights has the strong advantage that exact solutions can be obtained easily for the MFPT through the origin, so a complete analytical characterization of the system dynamics can be provided. Furthermore, we discuss in detail how the phase transitions observed in random walks with resetting are closely related to several ideas recurrently used in the field of random search theory, in particular to other mechanisms proposed to understand random search in space as mortal random-walks or multi-scale random-walks. As a whole we corroborate that one of the essential ingredients behind MFPT minimization lies in the combination of multiple movement scales (whatever its origin).

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2015

First-passage times in multi-scale random walks: the impact of movement scales on search efficiency

An efficient searcher needs to balance properly the tradeoff between the exploration of new spatial areas and the exploitation of nearby resources, an idea which is at the core of scale-free Lévy search strategies. Here we study multi-scale random walks as an approximation to the scale- free case and derive the exact expressions for their mean-first passage times in a one-dimensional finite domain. This allows us to provide a complete analytical description of the dynamics driving the asymmetric regime, in which both nearby and faraway targets are available to the searcher. For this regime, we prove that the combination of only two movement scales can be enough to outperform both balistic and Lévy strategies. This two-scale strategy involves an optimal discrimination between the nearby and faraway targets, which is only possible by adjusting the range of values of the two movement scales to the typical distances between encounters. So, this optimization necessarily requires some prior information (albeit crude) about targets distances or distributions. Furthermore, we found that the incorporation of additional (three, four, ...) movement scales and its adjustment to target distances does not improve further the search efficiency. This allows us to claim that optimal random search strategies in the asymmetric regime actually arise through the informed combination of only two walk scales (related to the exploitative and the explorative scale, respectively), expanding on the well-known result that optimal strategies in strictly uninformed scenarios are achieved through Lévy paths (or, equivalently, through a hierarchical combination of multiple scales).

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2015

Stochastic dynamics and logistic population growth

The Verhulst model is probably the best known macroscopic rate equation in population ecology. It depends on two parameters, the intrinsic growth rate and the carrying capacity. These parameters can be estimated for different populations and are related to the reproductive fitness and the competition for limited resources, respectively. We investigate analytically and numerically the simplest possible microscopic scenarios that give rise to the logistic equation in the deterministic mean-field limit. We provide a definition of the two parameters of the Verhulst equation in terms of microscopic parameters. In addition, we derive the conditions for extinction or persistence of the population by employing either the "momentum-space" spectral theory or the "real-space" Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin (WKB) approximation to determine the probability distribution function and the mean time to extinction of the population. Our analytical results agree well with numerical simulations.

q-bio.PE↗

arXiv2013

Comb-like models for transport along spiny dendrites

We suggest a modification of a comb model to describe anomalous transport in spiny dendrites. Geometry of the comb structure consisting of a one-dimensional backbone and lateral branches makes it possible to describe anomalous diffusion, where dynamics inside fingers corresponds to spines, while the backbone describes diffusion along dendrites. The presented analysis establishes that the fractional dynamics in spiny dendrites is controlled by fractal geometry of the comb structure and fractional kinetics inside the spines. Our results show that the transport along spiny dendrites is subdiffusive and depends on the density of spines in agreement with recent experiments.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv2008

The effects of distributed life cycles on the dynamics of viral infections

We explore the role of cellular life cycles for viruses and host cells in an infection process. For this purpose, we derive a generalized version of the basic model of virus dynamics (Nowak, M.A., Bangham, C.R.M., 1996. Population dynamics of immune responses to persistent viruses. Science 272, 74-79) from a mesoscopic description. In its final form the model can be written as a set of Volterra integrodifferential equations. We consider the role of age-distributed delays for death times and the intracellular (eclipse) phase. These processes are implemented by means of probability distribution functions. The basic reproductive ratio $R_0$ of the infection is properly defined in terms of such distributions by using an analysis of the equilibrium states and their stability. It is concluded that the introduction of distributed delays can strongly modify both the value of $R_0$ and the predictions for the virus loads, so the effects on the infection dynamics are of major importance. We also show how the model presented here can be applied to some simple situations where direct comparison with experiments is possible. Specifically, phage-bacteria interactions are analysed. The dynamics of the eclipse phase for phages is characterized analytically, which allows us to compare the performance of three different fittings proposed before for the one-step growth curve.

q-bio.PE↗

arXiv2008

Limited resources and evolutionary learning may help to understand the mistimed reproduction in birds caused by climate change

We present an agent-based model inspired by the Evolutionary Minority Game (EMG), albeit strongly adapted to the case of competition for limited resources in ecology. The agents in this game become able, after some time, to predict the a priori best option as a result of an evolution-driven learning process. We show that a self-segregated social structure can emerge from this process, i.e., extreme learning strategies are always favoured while intermediate learning strategies tend to die out. This result may contribute to understanding some levels of organization and cooperative behaviour in ecological and social systems. We use the ideas and results reported here to discuss an issue of current interest in ecology: the mistimings in egg laying observed for some species of bird as a consequence of their slower rate of adaptation to climate change in comparison with that shown by their prey. Our model supports the hypothesis that habitat-specific constraints could explain why different populations are adapting differently to this situation, in agreement with recent experiments.

q-bio.PE↗

arXiv2008

Anomalous reaction-transport processes: the dynamics beyond the Mass Action Law

In this paper we reconsider the Mass Action Law (MAL) for the anomalous reversible reaction $A\rightleftarrows B$ with diffusion. We provide a mesoscopic description of this reaction when the transitions between two states $A$ and $B$ are governed by anomalous (heavy-tailed) waiting-time distributions. We derive the set of mesoscopic integro-differential equations for the mean densities of reacting and diffusing particles in both states. We show that the effective reaction rate memory kernels in these equations and the uniform asymptotic states depend on transport characteristics such as jumping rates. This is in contradiction with the classical picture of MAL. We find that transport can even induce an extinction of the particles such that the density of particles $A$ or $B$ tends asymptotically to zero. We verify analytical results by Monte Carlo simulations and show that the mesoscopic densities exhibit a transient growth before decay.

cond-mat.stat-mech↗

arXiv1997

New cosmological solutions and stability analysis in full extended thermodynamics

The Einstein's field equations of FRW universes filled with a dissipative fluid described by full theory of causal transport equations are analyzed. New exact solutions are found using a non-local transformations on the nonlinear differential equation for the Hubble factor. The stability of the de Sitter and asymptotically friedmannian solutions are analyzed using Lyapunov function method.

gr-qc↗