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Random walk in a two-dimensional self-affine random potential: Properties of the anomalous diffusion phase at small external force.

C. Monthus,T. Garel

Published 2010 in Physical review. E, Statistical, nonlinear, and soft matter physics

ABSTRACT

We study the dynamical response to an external force F for a particle performing a random walk in a two-dimensional quenched random potential of Hurst exponent H=1/2 . We present numerical results on the statistics of first-passage times that satisfy closed backward master equations. We find that there exists a zero-velocity phase in a finite region of the external force 0<F<F{c} , where the dynamics follows the anomalous diffusion law x(t)∼ξ(F)t^{μ(F)} . The anomalous exponent 0<μ(F)<1 and the correlation length ξ(F) vary continuously with F . In the limit of vanishing force F→0 , we measure the following power laws: the anomalous exponent vanishes as μ(F)∝F^{a} with a≃0.6 (instead of a=1 in dimension d=1 ), and the correlation length diverges as ξ(F)∝F^{-ν} with ν≃1.29 (instead of ν=2 in dimension d=1 ). Our main conclusion is thus that the dynamics renormalizes onto an effective directed trap model, where the traps are characterized by a typical length ξ(F) along the direction of the force, and by a typical barrier 1/μ(F) . The fact that these traps are "smaller" in linear size and in depth than in dimension d=1 , means that the particle uses the transverse direction to find lower barriers.

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