English

Exact first-passage time distributions for three random diffusivity models

Statistical Mechanics 2021-10-14 v1 Biological Physics

Abstract

We study the extremal properties of a stochastic process xtx_t defined by a Langevin equation x˙t=2D0V(Bt)ξt\dot{x}_t=\sqrt{2 D_0 V(B_t)}\,\xi_t, where ξt\xi_t is a Gaussian white noise with zero mean, D0D_0 is a constant scale factor, and V(Bt)V(B_t) is a stochastic "diffusivity" (noise strength), which itself is a functional of independent Brownian motion BtB_t. We derive exact, compact expressions for the probability density functions (PDFs) of the first passage time (FPT) tt from a fixed location x0x_0 to the origin for three different realisations of the stochastic diffusivity: a cut-off case V(Bt)=Θ(Bt)V(B_t) =\Theta(B_t) (Model I), where Θ(x)\Theta(x) is the Heaviside theta function; a Geometric Brownian Motion V(Bt)=exp(Bt)V(B_t)=\exp(B_t) (Model II); and a case with V(Bt)=Bt2V(B_t)=B_t^2 (Model III). We realise that, rather surprisingly, the FPT PDF has exactly the L\'evy-Smirnov form (specific for standard Brownian motion) for Model II, which concurrently exhibits a strongly anomalous diffusion. For Models I and III either the left or right tails (or both) have a different functional dependence on time as compared to the L\'evy-Smirnov density. In all cases, the PDFs are broad such that already the first moment does not exist. Similar results are obtained in three dimensions for the FPT PDF to an absorbing spherical target.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2007.05765,
  title  = {Exact first-passage time distributions for three random diffusivity models},
  author = {D. S. Grebenkov and V. Sposini and R. Metzler and G. Oshanin and F. Seno},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2007.05765},
  year   = {2021}
}

Comments

8 pages, 3 figures, RevTeX

R2 v1 2026-06-23T17:02:32.204Z