Competitive nucleation in reversible Probabilistic Cellular Automata

TL;DR

This paper investigates how competitive nucleation occurs in reversible Probabilistic Cellular Automata, highlighting the role of self-interaction and metastable phases, with parallels to the Blume-Capel model.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed dynamical analysis of metastability and nucleation in probabilistic cellular automata, revealing new intermediate phases influenced by self-interaction.

Findings

Identification of an intermediate metastable phase with flip-flopping chessboard configurations

Dependence of metastability on the ratio of magnetic field to self-interaction

Similar behavior observed to the stochastic Blume-Capel model with Glauber dynamics

Abstract

The problem of competitive nucleation in the framework of Probabilistic Cellular Automata is studied from the dynamical point of view. The dependence of the metastability scenario on the self--interaction is discussed. An intermediate metastable phase, made of two flip--flopping chessboard configurations, shows up depending on the ratio between the magnetic field and the self--interaction. A behavior similar to the one of the stochastic Blume--Capel model with Glauber dynamics is found.