Self-organized criticality and directed percolation

A sandpile model with stochastic toppling rule is studied. The control parameters and the phase diagram are determined through a MF approach, the subcritical and critical regions are analyzed. The model is found to have some similarities with directed percolation, but the existence of different boundary conditions and conservation law leads to a different universality class, where the critical state is extended to a line segment due to self-organization. These results are supported with numerical simulations in one dimension. The present model constitute a simple model which capture the essential difference between ordinary nonequilibrium critical phenomena, like DP, and self-organized criticality.Comment: 9 pages, 10 eps figs, revtex, submitted to J. Phys.

Compact parity conserving percolation in one-dimension

Compact directed percolation is known to appear at the endpoint of the directed percolation critical line of the Domany-Kinzel cellular automaton in 1+1 dimension. Equivalently, such transition occurs at zero temperature in a magnetic field H, upon changing the sign of H, in the one-dimensional Glauber-Ising model with well known exponents characterising spin-cluster growth. We have investigated here numerically these exponents in the non-equilibrium generalization (NEKIM) of the Glauber model in the vicinity of the parity-conserving phase transition point of the kinks. Critical fluctuations on the level of kinks are found to affect drastically the characteristic exponents of spreading of spins while the hyperscaling relation holds in its form appropriate for compact clusters.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figures embedded in the latex, final form before J.Phys.A publicatio

The coil-globule transition of confined polymers

We study long polymer chains in a poor solvent, confined to the space between two parallel hard walls. The walls are energetically neutral and pose only a geometric constraint which changes the properties of the coil-globule (or "$\theta$-") transition. We find that the $\theta$ temperature increases monotonically with the width $D$ between the walls, in contrast to recent claims in the literature. Put in a wider context, the problem can be seen as a dimensional cross over in a tricritical point of a $\phi^4$ model. We roughly verify the main scaling properties expected for such a phenomenon, but we find also somewhat unexpected very long transients before the asymptotic scaling regions are reached. In particular, instead of the expected scaling $R\sim N^{4/7}$ exactly at the ($D$-dependent) theta point we found that $R$ increases less fast than $N^{1/2}$, even for extremely long chains.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figure

Absorbing Phase Transitions of Branching-Annihilating Random Walks

The phase transitions to absorbing states of the branching-annihilating reaction-diffusion processes mA --> (m+k)A, nA --> (n-l)A are studied systematically in one space dimension within a new family of models. Four universality classes of non-trivial critical behavior are found. This provides, in particular, the first evidence of universal scaling laws for pair and triplet processes.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure

Phase transitions and critical behaviour in one-dimensional non-equilibrium kinetic Ising models with branching annihilating random walk of kinks

One-dimensional non-equilibrium kinetic Ising models evolving under the competing effect of spin flips at zero temperature and nearest-neighbour spin exchanges exhibiting directed percolation-like parity conserving(PC) phase transition on the level of kinks are now further investigated, numerically, from the point of view of the underlying spin system. Critical exponents characterising its statics and dynamics are reported. It is found that the influence of the PC transition on the critical exponents of the spins is strong and the origin of drastic changes as compared to the Glauber-Ising case can be traced back to the hyperscaling law stemming from directed percolation(DP). Effect of an external magnetic field, leading to DP-type critical behaviour on the level of kinks, is also studied, mainly through the generalised mean field approximation.Comment: 15 pages, using RevTeX, 13 Postscript figures included, submitted to J.Phys.A, figures 12 and 13 fixe

Simulations of grafted polymers in a good solvent

We present improved simulations of three-dimensional self avoiding walks with one end attached to an impenetrable surface on the simple cubic lattice. This surface can either be a-thermal, having thus only an entropic effect, or attractive. In the latter case we concentrate on the adsorption transition, We find clear evidence for the cross-over exponent to be smaller than 1/2, in contrast to all previous simulations but in agreement with a re-summed field theoretic $\epsilon$-expansion. Since we use the pruned-enriched Rosenbluth method (PERM) which allows very precise estimates of the partition sum itself, we also obtain improved estimates for all entropic critical exponents.Comment: 5 pages with 9 figures included; minor change

The three species monomer-monomer model in the reaction-controlled limit

We study the one dimensional three species monomer-monomer reaction model in the reaction controlled limit using mean-field theory and dynamic Monte Carlo simulations. The phase diagram consists of a reactive steady state bordered by three equivalent adsorbing phases where the surface is saturated with one monomer species. The transitions from the reactive phase are all continuous, while the transitions between adsorbing phases are first-order. Bicritical points occur where the reactive phase simultaneously meets two adsorbing phases. The transitions from the reactive to an adsorbing phase show directed percolation critical behaviour, while the universal behaviour at the bicritical points is in the even branching annihilating random walk class. The results are contrasted and compared to previous results for the adsorption-controlled limit of the same model.Comment: 12 pages using RevTeX, plus 4 postscript figures. Uses psfig.sty. accepted to Journal of Physics

Correlated Initial Conditions in Directed Percolation

We investigate the influence of correlated initial conditions on the temporal evolution of a (d+1)-dimensional critical directed percolation process. Generating initial states with correlations ~r^(sigma-d) we observe that the density of active sites in Monte-Carlo simulations evolves as rho(t)~t^kappa. The exponent kappa depends continuously on sigma and varies in the range -beta/nu_{||}<=kappa<=eta. Our numerical results are confirmed by an exact field-theoretical renormalization group calculation.Comment: 10 pages, RevTeX, including 5 encapsulated postscript figure

Directed Percolation with a Wall or Edge

We examine the effects of introducing a wall or edge into a directed percolation process. Scaling ansatzes are presented for the density and survival probability of a cluster in these geometries, and we make the connection to surface critical phenomena and field theory. The results of previous numerical work for a wall can thus be interpreted in terms of surface exponents satisfying scaling relations generalising those for ordinary directed percolation. New exponents for edge directed percolation are also introduced. They are calculated in mean-field theory and measured numerically in 2+1 dimensions.Comment: 14 pages, submitted to J. Phys.