A characterization of strong percolation via disconnection

TL;DR

This paper characterizes the strongly percolative regime of the vacant set of random interlacements on high-dimensional lattices using a disconnection estimate, introducing a novel gluing technique that handles degeneracies without relying on finite-energy properties.

Contribution

It provides a new monotone property-based characterization of strong percolation in random interlacements, developing a gluing method that manages degeneracies in the conditional law.

Findings

A new characterization of strong percolation regime via disconnection estimates.

Development of a gluing technique that handles degeneracies without finite-energy assumptions.

Application of the characterization to prove a conjecture on critical parameters.

Abstract

We consider a percolation model, the vacant set $\mathcal{V}^u$ of random interlacements on $\mathbb{Z}^d$, $d \geq 3$, in the regime of parameters $u>0$ in which it is strongly percolative. By definition, such values of $u$ pinpoint a robust subset of the super-critical phase, with strong quantitative controls on large local clusters. In the present work, we give a new charaterization of this regime in terms of a single property, monotone in $u$, involving a disconnection estimate for $\mathcal{V}^u$. A key aspect is to exhibit a gluing property for large local clusters from this information alone, and a major challenge in this undertaking is the fact that the conditional law of $\mathcal{V}^u$ exhibits degeneracies. As one of the main novelties of this work, the gluing technique we develop to merge large clusters accounts for such effects. In particular, our methods do not rely on the widely assumed finite-energy property, which the set $\mathcal{V}^u$ does not possess. The charaterization we derive plays a decisive role in the proof of a lasting conjecture regarding the coincidence of various critical parameters naturally associated to $\mathcal{V}^u$ in a companion article.