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MP: Theoretische und Mathematische Grundlagen der Physik
MP 3: Hauptvorträge III
MP 3.2: Invited Talk
Thursday, March 26, 1998, 10:15–11:00, H46
The wetting phenomenon as a large deviation problem in the 2D Ising model — •Charles Pfister — Departement de Mathematiques Ecole Polytechnique Federale CH-1015 Lausanne.
Some aspects of the theory of large deviations are related to the thermodynamical behaviour of large systems. In absence of phase transition the rate function computed in the the theory of large deviations corresponds to a bulk thermodynamical function. More interesting situations occur in the phase coexisting region. In that case the rate function is related to surface thermodynamical functions, like the surface tension and boundary free energies. Recently these questions have been investigated in the 2D Ising model. For the first time a mathematical description of the wetting phenomenon has obtained in a canonical ensemble, starting from the basic principles of Statistical Mechanics. In the talk the main results and ideas will be exposed. The talk is partly based on earlier works by Froehlich and Pfister (Commun. Math. Phys. 109, 493 (1987) and (112, 51 (1987)) and mainly on the recent work of Pfister and Velenik to appear in Prob. Th. Rel. Fields (1997). (See also Pfister, Velenik Helv. Phys. Acta 69, 949 (1996).)