Step Initial Condition Research Articles

Macroscopic fluctuations of a driven tracer in the symmetric exclusion process

The dynamics of an asymmetric tracer in the symmetric simple exclusion process (SEP) is mapped, in the continuous scaling limit, to the local current through the origin in the zero-range process with a biased bond. This allows us to study the hydrodynamics of the SEP with an asymmetric tracer with a step initial condition, leading to the average displacement as a function of the bias and the densities on both sides. We then derive the cumulant generating function of the process in the high-density limit, by using the macroscopic fluctuation theory and obtain agreement with the microscopic results of Poncet et al (2021). For more general initial conditions, we show that the tracer variance in the high-density limit depends only on the generalized susceptibility in the initial condition.

Exact Solution of the Macroscopic Fluctuation Theory for the Symmetric Exclusion Process.

We present the first exact solution for the time-dependent equations of the macroscopic fluctuation theory (MFT) for the symmetric simple exclusion process by combining a generalization of the canonical Cole-Hopf transformation with the inverse scattering method. For the step initial condition with two densities, we obtain exact and compact formulas for the optimal density profile and the response field that produce a required fluctuation, both at initial and final times. The large deviation function of the current is derived and coincides with the formula obtained previously by microscopic calculations. This provides the first analytic confirmation of the validity of the MFT for an interacting model in the time-dependent regime.

Multipoint distribution of TASEP

Recently Johansson and Rahman obtained the limiting multitime distribution for the discrete polynuclear growth model (Johansson and Rahman (2019)), which is equivalent to a discrete TASEP model with step initial condition. In this paper, we obtain a finite time multipoint distribution formula of continuous TASEP with general initial conditions in the space-time plane. We evaluate the limit of this distribution function when the times go to infinity at the same speed for both step and flat initial conditions. These limiting distributions are expected to be universal for all the models in the Kardar–Parisi–Zhang universality class.

Multi-point distribution of discrete time periodic TASEP

We study the one-dimensional discrete time totally asymmetric simple exclusion process with parallel update rules on a spatially periodic domain. A multi-point space-time joint distribution formula is obtained for general initial conditions. The formula involves contour integrals of Fredholm determinants with kernels acting on certain discrete spaces. For a class of initial conditions satisfying certain technical assumptions, we are able to derive large-time, large-period limit of the joint distribution, under the relaxation time scale t=O(L^{3/2}) when the height fluctuations are critically affected by the finite geometry. The assumptions are verified for the step and flat initial conditions. As a corollary we obtain the multi-point distribution of discrete time TASEP on the whole integer lattice {mathbb {Z}} by taking the period L large enough so that the finite-time distribution is not affected by the boundary. The large time limit for the multi-time distribution of discrete time TASEP on {mathbb {Z}} is then obtained for the step initial condition.

Cutoff profile of ASEP on a segment

This paper studies the mixing behavior of the Asymmetric Simple Exclusion Process (ASEP) on a segment of length N. Our main result is that for particle densities in (0, 1), the total-variation cutoff window of ASEP is N^{1/3} and the cutoff profile is 1-F_{mathrm {GUE}}, where F_{mathrm {GUE}} is the Tracy-Widom distribution function. This also gives a new proof of the cutoff itself, shown earlier by Labbé and Lacoin. Our proof combines coupling arguments, the result of Tracy–Widom about fluctuations of ASEP started from the step initial condition, and exact algebraic identities coming from interpreting the multi-species ASEP as a random walk on a Hecke algebra.

Flats, spikes and crevices: the evolving shape of the inhomogeneous corner growth model

We study the macroscopic evolution of the growing cluster in the exactly solvable corner growth model with independent exponentially distributed waiting times. The rates of the exponentials are given by an addivitely separable function of the site coordinates. When computing the growth process (last-passage times) at each site, the horizontal and vertical additive components of the rates are allowed to also vary respectively with the column and row number of that site. This setting includes several models of interest from the literature as special cases. Our main result provides simple explicit variational formulas for the a.s. first-order asymptotics of the growth process under a decay condition on the rates. Subject to further mild conditions, we prove the existence of the limit shape and describe it explicitly. We observe that the boundary of the limit shape can develop flat segments adjacent to the axes and spikes along the axes. Furthermore, we record the formation of persistent macroscopic spikes and crevices in the cluster that are nonetheless not visible in the limit shape. As an application of the results for the growth process, we compute the flux function and limiting particle profile for the TASEP with the step initial condition and disorder in the jump rates of particles and holes. Our methodology is based on concentration bounds and estimating the boundary exit probabilities of the geodesics in the increment-stationary version of the model, with the only input from integrable probability being the distributional invariance of the last-passage times under permutations of columns and rows.

Periodic TASEP with general initial conditions

We consider the one-dimensional totally asymmetric simple exclusion process with an arbitrary initial condition in a spatially periodic domain, and obtain explicit formulas for the multi-point distributions in the space-time plane. The formulas are given in terms of an integral involving a Fredholm determinant. We then evaluate the large-time, large-period limit in the relaxation time scale, which is the scale such that the system size starts to affect the height fluctuations. The limit is obtained assuming certain conditions on the initial condition, which we show that the step, flat, and step-flat initial conditions satisfy. Hence, we obtain the limit theorem for these three initial conditions in the periodic model, extending the previous work on the step initial condition. We also consider uniform random and uniform-step random initial conditions.

Current fluctuations in noninteracting run-and-tumble particles in one dimension

We present a general framework to study the distribution of the flux through the origin up to time t, in a noninteracting one-dimensional system of particles with a step initial condition with a fixed density ρ of particles to the left of the origin. We focus principally on two cases: (i) particles undergoing diffusive dynamics (passive case) and (ii) run-and-tumble dynamics for each particle (active case). In analogy with disordered systems, we consider the flux distribution for both the annealed and the quenched initial conditions, for passive and active particles. In the annealed case, we show that, for arbitrary particle dynamics, the flux distribution is a Poissonian with a mean μ(t) that we compute exactly in terms of the Green's function of the single-particle dynamics. For the quenched case, we show that, for the run-and-tumble dynamics, the quenched flux distribution takes an anomalous large-deviation form at large times, P_{qu}(Q,t)∼exp[-ρv_{0}γt^{2}ψ_{RTP}(Q/ρv_{0}t)], where γ is the rate of tumbling and v_{0} is the ballistic speed between two successive tumblings. In this paper, we compute the rate function ψ_{RTP}(q) and show that it is nontrivial. Our method also gives access to the probability of the rare event that, at time t, there is no particle to the right of the origin. For diffusive and run-and-tumble dynamics, we find that this probability decays with time as a stretched exponential, ∼exp(-csqrt[t]), where the constant c can be computed exactly. We verify our results for these large deviations by using an importance sampling Monte Carlo method.

Symmetric elliptic functions, IRF models, and dynamic exclusion processes

We introduce stochastic Interaction-Round-a-Face (IRF) models that are related to representations of the elliptic quantum group E_{\tau, \eta}(sl_2) . For stochastic IRF models in a quadrant, we evaluate averages for a broad family of observables that can be viewed as higher analogs of q -moments of the height function for the stochastic (higher spin) six vertex models. In a certain limit, the stochastic IRF models degenerate to (1+1)d interacting particle systems that we call dynamic ASEP and SSEP; their jump rates depend on local values of the height function. For the step initial condition, we evaluate averages of observables for them as well, and use those to investigate one-point asymptotics of the dynamic SSEP. The construction and proofs are based on remarkable properties (branching and Pieri rules, Cauchy identities) of a (seemingly new) family of symmetric elliptic functions that arise as matrix elements in an infinite volume limit of the algebraic Bethe ansatz for E_{\tau, \eta}(sl_2) .

The q-TASEP with a Random Initial Condition

When studying fluctuations of models in the 1D KPZ class including the ASEP and the $q$-TASEP, a standard approach has been to first write down a formula for $q$-deformed moments and constitute their generating function. This works well for the step initial condition, but there is a difficulty for a random initial condition (including the stationary case): in this case only the first few moments are finite and the rest diverge. In a previous work [16], we presented a method dealing directly with the $q$-deformed Laplace transform of an observable, in which the above difficulty does not appear. There the Ramanujan's summation formula and the Cauchy determinant for the theta functions play an important role. In this note, we give an alternative approach for the $q$-TASEP without using them.

Distributions of a particle’s position and their asymptotics in the [formula omitted]-deformed totally asymmetric zero range process with site dependent jumping rates

In this paper we study the probability distribution of the position of a tagged particle in the q-deformed Totally Asymmetric Zero Range Process (q-TAZRP) with site dependent jumping rates. For a finite particle system, it is derived from the transition probability previously obtained by Wang and Waugh. We also provide the probability distribution formula for a tagged particle in the q-TAZRP with the so-called step initial condition in which infinitely many particles occupy one single site and all other sites are unoccupied. For the q-TAZRP with step initial condition, we provide a Fredholm determinant representation for the probability distribution function of the position of a tagged particle, and moreover we obtain the limiting distribution function as the time goes to infinity. Our asymptotic result for q-TAZRP with step initial condition is comparable to the limiting distribution function obtained by Tracy and Widom for the kth leftmost particle in the asymmetric simple exclusion process with step initial condition (Theorem 2 in Tracy and Widom (2009)).

Blocks and gaps in the asymmetric simple exclusion process: Asymptotics

In earlier work, the authors obtained formulas for the probability in the asymmetric simple exclusion process that at time t, a particle is at site x and is the beginning of a block of L consecutive particles. Here we consider asymptotics. Specifically, for the Kardar-Parisi-Zhang regime with step initial condition, we determine the conditional probability (asymptotically as t → ∞) that a particle is the beginning of an L-block, given that it is at site x at time t. Using duality between occupied and unoccupied sites, we obtain the analogous result for a gap of G unoccupied sites between the particle at x and the next one.

On the TASEP with Second Class Particles

In this paper we study some conditional probabilities for the totally asymmetric simple exclusion processes (TASEP) with second class particles. To be more specific, we consider a finite system with one first class particle and $N-1$ second class particles, and we assume that the first class particle is initially at the leftmost position. In this case, we find the probability that the first class particle is at $x$ and it is still the leftmost particle at time $t$. In particular, we show that this probability is expressed by the determinant of an $N\times N$ matrix of contour integrals if the initial positions of particles satisfy the step initial condition. The resulting formula is very similar to a known formula in the (usual) TASEP with the step initial condition which was used for asymptotics by Nagao and Sasamoto [Nuclear Phys. B 699 (2004), 487-502].

Blocks in the asymmetric simple exclusion process

In earlier work the authors obtained formulas for the probability in the asymmetric simple exclusion process that the $m$th particle from the left is at site $x$ at time $t$. They were expressed in general as sums of multiple integrals and, for the case of step initial condition, as an integral involving a Fredholm determinant. In the present work these results are generalized to the case where the $m$th particle is the left-most one in a contiguous block of $L$ particles. The earlier work depended in a crucial way on two combinatorial identities, and the present work begins with a generalization of these identities to general $L$.

Some conditional probabilities in the TASEP with second class particles

In this paper we consider the TASEP with second class particles with the initial order is such that $k$ first class particles are located to the left of $N-k$ second class particles. Under this assumption of the initial state of order, we find the probability that the first class particles are at $x,x+1,\cdots, x+k-1$ and the first class particles are still located to the left of all second class particles at later time $t$. Moreover, we obtain an explicit formula of this probability for the step initial condition. This probability generalizes a result for $k=1$ in Lee (arXiv:1705.10544).

Zone clearance in an infinite TASEP with a step initial condition

The TASEP is a paradigmatic model of out-of-equilibrium statistical physics, for which many quantities have been computed, either exactly or by approximate methods. In this work we study two new kinds of observables that have some relevance in biological or traffic models. They represent the probability for a given clearance zone of the lattice to be empty (for the first time) at a given time, starting from a step density profile. Exact expressions are obtained for single-time quantities, while more involved history-dependent observables are studied by Monte Carlo simulation, and partially predicted by a phenomenological approach.

On the distribution of the largest real eigenvalue for the real Ginibre ensemble

Let N−−√+λmaxN+λmax be the largest real eigenvalue of a random N×NN×N matrix with independent N(0,1)N(0,1) entries (the “real Ginibre matrix”). We study the large deviations behaviour of the limiting N→∞N→∞ distribution P[λmax 0t>0, P[λmax<t]=1−14erfc(t)+O(e−2t2). P[λmax<t]=1−14erfc⁡(t)+O(e−2t2). This is a rigorous confirmation of the corresponding result of [Phys. Rev. Lett. 99 (2007) 050603]. We also prove that the left tail is exponential, with correct asymptotics up to O(1)O(1): for t<0t<0, P[λmax<t]=e122π√ζ(32)t+O(1), P[λmax<t]=e122πζ(32)t+O(1), where ζζ is the Riemann zeta-function. Our results have implications for interacting particle systems. The edge scaling limit of the law of real eigenvalues for the real Ginibre ensemble is a rescaling of a fixed time distribution of annihilating Brownian motions (ABMs) with the step initial condition; see [Garrod, Poplavskyi, Tribe and Zaboronski (2015)]. Therefore, the tail behaviour of the distribution of X(max)sXs(max)—the position of the rightmost annihilating particle at fixed time s>0s>0—can be read off from the corresponding answers for λmaxλmax using X(max)s=D4s−−√λmaxXs(max)=D4sλmax.

The ASEP and Determinantal Point Processes

We introduce a family of discrete determinantal point processes related to orthogonal polynomials on the real line, with correlation kernels defined via spectral projections for the associated Jacobi matrices. For classical weights, we show how such ensembles arise as limits of various hypergeometric orthogonal polynomials ensembles. We then prove that the q-Laplace transform of the height function of the ASEP with step initial condition is equal to the expectation of a simple multiplicative functional on a discrete Laguerre ensemble --- a member of the new family. This allows us to obtain the large time asymptotics of the ASEP in three limit regimes: (a) for finitely many rightmost particles; (b) GUE Tracy-Widom asymptotics of the height function; (c) KPZ asymptotics of the height function for the ASEP with weak asymmetry. We also give similar results for two instances of the stochastic six vertex model in a quadrant. The proofs are based on limit transitions for the corresponding determinantal point processes.

Higher spin six vertex model and symmetric rational functions

We consider a fully inhomogeneous stochastic higher spin six vertex model in a quadrant. For this model we derive concise integral representations for multi-point q-moments of the height function and for the q-correlation functions. At least in the case of the step initial condition, our formulas degenerate in appropriate limits to many known formulas of such type for integrable probabilistic systems in the (1 $$+$$ 1)d KPZ universality class, including the stochastic six vertex model, ASEP, various q-TASEPs, and associated zero range processes. Our arguments are largely based on properties of a family of symmetric rational functions that can be defined as partition functions of the inhomogeneous higher spin six vertex model for suitable domains. In the homogeneous case, such functions were previously studied in Borodin (On a family of symmetric rational functions, 2014); they also generalize classical Hall–Littlewood and Schur polynomials. A key role is played by Cauchy-like summation identities for these functions, which are obtained as a direct corollary of the Yang–Baxter equation for the higher spin six vertex model.

TASEP on a Ring in Sub-relaxation Time Scale

Interacting particle systems in the KPZ universality class on a ring of size $L$ with $O(L)$ number of particles are expected to change from KPZ dynamics to equilibrium dynamics at the so-called relaxation time scale $t=O(L^{3/2})$. In particular the system size is expected to have little effect to the particle fluctuations in the sub-relaxation time scale $t\ll L^{3/2}$. We prove that this is indeed the case for the totally asymmetric simple exclusion process (TASEP) with two types of initial conditions. For flat initial condition, we show that the particle fluctuations are given by the Airy$_1$ process as in the infinite TASEP with flat initial condition. On the other hand, the TASEP on a ring with step initial condition is equivalent to the periodic TASEP with a certain shock initial condition. We compute the fluctuations explicitly both away from and near the shocks for the infinite TASEP with same initial condition, and then show that the periodic TASEP has same fluctuations in the sub-relaxation time scale.