Related papers: Euclidean Dynamical Triangulation revisited: is th…
The transition between the two phases of 4D Euclidean Dynamical Triangulation [1] was long believed to be of second order until in 1996 first order behavior was found for sufficiently large systems [5,9]. However, one may wonder if this…
We confirm recent claims that, contrary to what was generally believed, the phase transition of the dynamical triangulation model of four-dimensional quantum gravity is of first order. We have looked at this at a volume of 64,000…
We study a $U(N)\times U(N)$ symmetric scalar field model in four and three dimensions. First, using our data in four dimensions in the weak coupling region, we demonstrate explicitly that the observed first order phase transition is…
We explore an extended coupling constant space of 4d regularized Euclidean quantum gravity, defined via the formalism of dynamical triangulations. We add a measure term which can also serve as a generalized higher curvature term and…
We present a study of the phase diagram of a random optimization problem in presence of quantum fluctuations. Our main result is the characterization of the nature of the phase transition, which we find to be a first-order quantum phase…
The dynamics of weak vs. strong first order phase transitions is investigated numerically for 2+1 dimensional scalar field models. It is argued that the change from a weak to a strong transition is itself a (second order) phase transition,…
The $2$d orders are a sub class of causal sets, which is especially amenable to computer simulations. Past work has shown that the $2$d orders have a first order phase transition between a random and a crystalline phase. When coupling the…
We perform large scale simulations to characterize the transition in quenched QCD. It is shown by a rigorous finite size scaling that the transition is of first order. After this qualitative feature quantitative results are obtained with…
We study the phase diagram of the $U(2) \times U(2)$ scalar model in $d=4$ dimensions. We find that the phase transition is of first order in most of the parameter space. The theory can still be relevant to continuum physics (as an…
A spatially extended classical system with metastable states subject to weak spatiotemporal noise can exhibit a transition in its activation behavior when one or more external parameters are varied. Depending on the potential, the…
When placed on an inclined plane, a perfect 2D disk or 3D sphere simply rolls down in a straight line under gravity. But how is the rolling affected if these shapes are irregular or random? Treating the terminal rolling speed as an order…
First order quantum phase transitions (1QPTs) are signaled, in the thermodynamic limit, by discontinuous changes in the ground state properties. These discontinuities affect expectation values of observables, including spatial correlations.…
Dynamical phase transitions (DPTs) arise from qualitative changes in the long-time behavior of stochastic trajectories, often observed in systems with kinetic constraints or driven out of equilibrium. Here we demonstrate that first-order…
We demonstrate that first-order phase transitions in 1+1-dimensional nonequilibrium systems with fluctuating ordered phases are impossible, provided that there are no additional conservation laws, long-range interactions, macroscopic…
We present experimental evidence for a first-order freezing/melting phase transition in a nonequilibrium system -- an oscillated two-dimensional isobaric granular fluid. The steady-state transition occurs between a gas and a crystal and is…
Quantum phase transitions have been the subject of intense investigations in the last two decades [1]. Among other problems, these phase transitions are relevant in the study of heavy fermion systems, high temperature superconductors and…
The crumpled-to-flat phase transition that occurs in D-dimensional polymerized phantom membranes embedded in a d-dimensional space is investigated nonperturbatively using a field expansion up to order eight in powers of the order parameter.…
Onset and loss of synchronization in coupled oscillators are of fundamental importance in understanding emergent behavior in natural and man-made systems, which range from neural networks to power grids. We report on experiments with…
We investigate the role of large amplitude sub-critical thermal fluctuations in the dynamics of first order phase transitions. In particular, we obtain a kinetic equation for the number density of sub-critical fluctuations of the…
The dynamics of first order phase transitions are studied in the context of (3+1)-dimensional scalar field theories. Particular attention is paid to the question of quantifying the strength of the transition, and how `weak' and `strong'…