Can cooperation slow down emergency evacuations?

We study the motion of pedestrians through obscure corridors where the lack of visibility hides the precise position of the exits. Using a lattice model, we explore the effects of cooperation on the overall exit flux (evacuation rate). More precisely, we study the effect of the buddying threshold (of no--exclusion per site) on the dynamics of the crowd. In some cases, we note that if the evacuees tend to cooperate and act altruistically, then their collective action tends to favor the occurrence of disasters.Comment: arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1203.485

Renormalization-group at criticality and complete analyticity of constrained models: a numerical study

We study the majority rule transformation applied to the Gibbs measure for the 2--D Ising model at the critical point. The aim is to show that the renormalized hamiltonian is well defined in the sense that the renormalized measure is Gibbsian. We analyze the validity of Dobrushin-Shlosman Uniqueness (DSU) finite-size condition for the "constrained models" corresponding to different configurations of the "image" system. It is known that DSU implies, in our 2--D case, complete analyticity from which, as it has been recently shown by Haller and Kennedy, Gibbsianness follows. We introduce a Monte Carlo algorithm to compute an upper bound to Vasserstein distance (appearing in DSU) between finite volume Gibbs measures with different boundary conditions. We get strong numerical evidence that indeed DSU condition is verified for a large enough volume $V$ for all constrained models.Comment: 39 pages, teX file, 4 Postscript figures, 1 TeX figur

Renormalization Group results for lattice surface models

We study the phase diagram of statistical systems of closed and open interfaces built on a cubic lattice. Interacting closed interfaces can be written as Ising models, while open surfaces as Z(2) gauge systems. When the open surfaces reduce to closed interfaces with few defects, also the gauge model can be written as an Ising spin model. We apply the lower bound renormalization group (LBRG) transformation introduced by Kadanoff (Phys. Rev. Lett. 34, 1005 (1975)) to study the Ising models describing closed and open surfaces with few defects. In particular, we have studied the Ising-like transition of self-avoiding surfaces between the random-isotropic phase and the phase with broken global symmetry at varying values of the mean curvature. Our results are compared with previous numerical work. The limits of the LBRG transformation in describing regions of the phase diagram where not ferromagnetic ground-states are relevant are also discussed.Comment: 24 pages, latex, 5 figures (available upon request to [email protected]

Finite size scaling in three-dimensional bootstrap percolation

We consider the problem of bootstrap percolation on a three dimensional lattice and we study its finite size scaling behavior. Bootstrap percolation is an example of Cellular Automata defined on the $d$-dimensional lattice $\{1,2,...,L\}^d$ in which each site can be empty or occupied by a single particle; in the starting configuration each site is occupied with probability $p$, occupied sites remain occupied for ever, while empty sites are occupied by a particle if at least $\ell$ among their $2d$ nearest neighbor sites are occupied. When $d$ is fixed, the most interesting case is the one $\ell=d$: this is a sort of threshold, in the sense that the critical probability $p_c$ for the dynamics on the infinite lattice ${\Bbb Z}^d$ switches from zero to one when this limit is crossed. Finite size effects in the three-dimensional case are already known in the cases $\ell\le 2$: in this paper we discuss the case $\ell=3$ and we show that the finite size scaling function for this problem is of the form $f(L)={\mathrm{const}}/\ln\ln L$. We prove a conjecture proposed by A.C.D. van Enter.Comment: 18 pages, LaTeX file, no figur

Metastability for reversible probabilistic cellular automata with self--interaction

The problem of metastability for a stochastic dynamics with a parallel updating rule is addressed in the Freidlin--Wentzel regime, namely, finite volume, small magnetic field, and small temperature. The model is characterized by the existence of many fixed points and cyclic pairs of the zero temperature dynamics, in which the system can be trapped in its way to the stable phase. %The characterization of the metastable behavior %of a system in the context of parallel dynamics is a very difficult task, %since all the jumps in the configuration space are allowed. Our strategy is based on recent powerful approaches, not needing a complete description of the fixed points of the dynamics, but relying on few model dependent results. We compute the exit time, in the sense of logarithmic equivalence, and characterize the critical droplet that is necessarily visited by the system during its excursion from the metastable to the stable state. We need to supply two model dependent inputs: (1) the communication energy, that is the minimal energy barrier that the system must overcome to reach the stable state starting from the metastable one; (2) a recurrence property stating that for any configuration different from the metastable state there exists a path, starting from such a configuration and reaching a lower energy state, such that its maximal energy is lower than the communication energy

Stationary uphill currents in locally perturbed Zero Range Processes

Uphill currents are observed when mass diffuses in the direction of the density gradient. We study this phenomenon in stationary conditions in the framework of locally perturbed 1D Zero Range Processes (ZRP). We show that the onset of currents flowing from the reservoir with smaller density to the one with larger density can be caused by a local asymmetry in the hopping rates on a single site at the center of the lattice. For fixed injection rates at the boundaries, we prove that a suitable tuning of the asymmetry in the bulk may induce uphill diffusion at arbitrarily large, finite volumes. We also deduce heuristically the hydrodynamic behavior of the model and connect the local asymmetry characterizing the ZRP dynamics to a matching condition relevant for the macroscopic problem

Linear Boltzmann dynamics in a strip with large reflective obstacles: stationary state and residence time

The presence of obstacles modify the way in which particles diffuse. In cells, for instance, it is observed that, due to the presence of macromolecules playing the role of obstacles, the mean square displacement ofbiomolecules scales as a power law with exponent smaller than one. On the other hand, different situations in grain and pedestrian dynamics in which the presence of an obstacle accelerate the dynamics are known. We focus on the time, called residence time, needed by particles to cross a strip assuming that the dynamics inside the strip follows the linear Boltzmann dynamics. We find that the residence time is not monotonic with the sizeand the location of the obstacles, since the obstacle can force those particles that eventually cross the strip to spend a smaller time in the strip itself. We focus on the case of a rectangular strip with two open sides and two reflective sides and we consider reflective obstaclea into the strip

Does communication enhance pedestrians transport in the dark?

We study the motion of pedestrians through an obscure tunnel where the lack of visibility hides the exits. Using a lattice model, we explore the effects of communication on the effective transport properties of the crowd of pedestrians. More precisely, we study the effect of two thresholds on the structure of the effective nonlinear diffusion coefficient. One threshold models pedestrians's communication efficiency in the dark, while the other one describes the tunnel capacity. Essentially, we note that if the evacuees show a maximum trust (leading to a fast communication), they tend to quickly find the exit and hence the collective action tends to prevent the occurrence of disasters

Metastability in the two-dimensional Ising model with free boundary conditions

We investigate metastability in the two dimensional Ising model in a square with free boundary conditions at low temperatures. Starting with all spins down in a small positive magnetic field, we show that the exit from this metastable phase occurs via the nucleation of a critical droplet in one of the four corners of the system. We compute the lifetime of the metastable phase analytically in the limit $T\to 0$, $h\to 0$ and via Monte Carlo simulations at fixed values of $T$ and $h$ and find good agreement. This system models the effects of boundary domains in magnetic storage systems exiting from a metastable phase when a small external field is applied.Comment: 24 pages, TeX fil

Kink Localization under Asymmetric Double-Well Potential

We study diffuse phase interfaces under asymmetric double-well potential energies with degenerate minima and demonstrate that the limiting sharp profile, for small interface energy cost, on a finite space interval is in general not symmetric and its position depends exclusively on the second derivatives of the potential energy at the two minima (phases). We discuss an application of the general result to porous media in the regime of solid-fluid segregation under an applied pressure and describe the interface between a fluid-rich and a fluid-poor phase. Asymmetric double-well potential energies are also relevant in a very different field of physics as that of Brownian motors. An intriguing analogy between our result and the direction of the dc soliton current in asymmetric substrate driven Brownian motors is pointed out