Drowsy Cheetah Hunting Antelopes: A Diffusing Predator Seeking Fleeing Prey

We consider a system of three random walkers (a `cheetah' surrounded by two `antelopes') diffusing in one dimension. The cheetah and the antelopes diffuse, but the antelopes experience in addition a deterministic relative drift velocity, away from the cheetah, proportional to their distance from the cheetah, such that they tend to move away from the cheetah with increasing time. Using the backward Fokker-Planck equation we calculate, as a function of their initial separations, the probability that the cheetah has caught neither antelope after infinite time.Comment: 5 page

Phase Ordering Dynamics of the O(n) Model - Exact Predictions and Numerical Results

We consider the pair correlation functions of both the order parameter field and its square for phase ordering in the $O(n)$ model with nonconserved order parameter, in spatial dimension $2\le d\le 3$ and spin dimension $1\le n\le d$. We calculate, in the scaling limit, the exact short-distance singularities of these correlation functions and compare these predictions to numerical simulations. Our results suggest that the scaling hypothesis does not hold for the $d=2$ $O(2)$ model. Figures (23) are available on request - email [email protected]: 23 pages, Plain LaTeX, M/C.TH.93/2

The de Almeida-Thouless line in vector spin glasses

We consider the infinite-range spin glass in which the spins have m > 1 components (a vector spin glass). Applying a magnetic field which is random in direction, there is an Almeida Thouless (AT) line below which the "replica symmetric" solution is unstable, just as for the Ising (m=1) case. We calculate the location of this AT line for Gaussian random fields for arbitrary m, and verify our results by numerical simulations for m = 3$.Comment: 19 pages, 4 eps figure

Langevin Equation for the Density of a System of Interacting Langevin Processes

We present a simple derivation of the stochastic equation obeyed by the density function for a system of Langevin processes interacting via a pairwise potential. The resulting equation is considerably different from the phenomenological equations usually used to describe the dynamics of non conserved (Model A) and conserved (Model B) particle systems. The major feature is that the spatial white noise for this system appears not additively but multiplicatively. This simply expresses the fact that the density cannot fluctuate in regions devoid of particles. The steady state for the density function may however still be recovered formally as a functional integral over the coursed grained free energy of the system as in Models A and B.Comment: 6 pages, latex, no figure

Non-Markovian Persistence at the PC point of a 1d non-equilibrium kinetic Ising model

One-dimensional non-equilibrium kinetic Ising models evolving under the competing effect of spin flips at zero temperature and nearest neighbour spin exchanges exhibiting a parity-conserving (PC) phase transition on the level of kinks are investigated here numerically from the point of view of the underlying spin system. The dynamical persistency exponent $\Theta$ and the exponent $lambda$ characterising the two-time autocorrelation function of the total magnetization under non-equilibrium conditions are reported. It is found that the PC transition has strong effect: the process becomes non-Markovian and the above exponents exhibit drastic changes as compared to the Glauber-Ising case.Comment: 6 pages, Latex, postscript figures include

Singlet-Triplet Excitations in the Unconventional Spin-Peierls System TiOBr

We have performed time-of-flight neutron scattering measurements on powder samples of the unconventional spin-Peierls compound TiOBr using the fine-resolution Fermi chopper spectrometer (SEQUOIA) at the SNS. These measurements reveal two branches of magnetic excitations within the commensurate and incommensurate spin-Peierls phases, which we associate with n = 1 and n = 2 triplet excitations out of the singlet ground state. These measurements represent the first direct measure of the singlet-triplet energy gap in TiOBr, which is determined to be Eg = 21.2 +/- 1.0 meV.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures, submitted for publicatio

Absence of aging in the remanent magnetization in Migdal-Kadanoff spin glasses

We study the non-equilibrium behavior of three-dimensional spin glasses in the Migdal-Kadanoff approximation, that is on a hierarchical lattice. In this approximation the model has an unique ground state and equilibrium properties correctly described by the droplet model. Extensive numerical simulations show that this model lacks aging in the remanent magnetization as well as a maximum in the magnetic viscosity in disagreement with experiments as well as with numerical studies of the Edwards-Anderson model. This result strongly limits the validity of the droplet model (at least in its simplest form) as a good model for real spin glasses.Comment: 4 pages and 3 figures. References update

Growth Laws for Phase Ordering

We determine the characteristic length scale, $L(t)$, in phase ordering kinetics for both scalar and vector fields, with either short- or long-range interactions, and with or without conservation laws. We obtain $L(t)$ consistently by comparing the global rate of energy change to the energy dissipation from the local evolution of the order parameter. We derive growth laws for O(n) models, and our results can be applied to other systems with similar defect structures.Comment: 12 pages, LaTeX, second tr

Slow Logarithmic Decay of Magnetization in the Zero Temperature Dynamics of an Ising Spin Chain: Analogy to Granular Compaction

We study the zero temperature coarsening dynamics in an Ising chain in presence of a dynamically induced field that favors locally the `-' phase compared to the `+' phase. At late times, while the `+' domains still coarsen as $t^{1/2}$, the `-' domains coarsen slightly faster as $t^{1/2}\log (t)$. As a result, at late times, the magnetization decays slowly as, $m(t)=-1 +{\rm const.}/{\log (t)}$. We establish this behavior both analytically within an independent interval approximation (IIA) and numerically. In the zero volume fraction limit of the `+' phase, we argue that the IIA becomes asymptotically exact. Our model can be alternately viewed as a simple Ising model for granular compaction. At late times in our model, the system decays into a fully compact state (where all spins are `-') in a slow logarithmic manner $\sim 1/{\log (t)}$, a fact that has been observed in recent experiments on granular systems.Comment: 4 pages Revtex, 3 eps figures, supersedes cond-mat/000221

Correlated random fields in dielectric and spin glasses

Both orientational glasses and dipolar glasses possess an intrinsic random field, coming from the volume difference between impurity and host ions. We show this suppresses the glass transition, causing instead a crossover to the low $T$ phase. Moreover the random field is correlated with the inter-impurity interactions, and has a broad distribution. This leads to a peculiar variant of the Imry-Ma mechanism, with 'domains' of impurities oriented by a few frozen pairs. These domains are small: predictions of domain size are given for specific systems, and their possible experimental verification is outlined. In magnetic glasses in zero field the glass transition survives, because the random fields are disallowed by time-reversal symmetry; applying a magnetic field then generates random fields, and suppresses the spin glass transition.Comment: minor modifications, final versio