Breakdown of Kolmogorov scaling in models of cluster aggregation

Gelation in input-driven aggregation

We investigate irreversible aggregation processes driven by a source of small mass clusters. In the spatially homogeneous situation, a well-mixed system consists of clusters of various masses whose concentrations evolve according to an infinite system of nonlinear ordinary differential equations. We focus on the cluster mass distribution in the long-time limit. An input-driven aggregation with rates proportional to the product of merging partners undergoes a percolation transition. We examine this process analytically and numerically. There are two theoretical schemes and two natural ways of numerical integration on the level of a truncated system with a finite number of equations. After the percolation transition, the behavior depends on the adopted approach: The giant component quickly engulfs the entire system (Flory approach), or a nontrivial stationary mass distribution emerges (Stockmayer approach). We also outline a generalization to ternary aggregation.

Exact Calculation of the Probabilities of Rare Events in Cluster-Cluster Aggregation

We develop an action formalism to calculate probabilities of rare events in cluster-cluster aggregation for arbitrary collision kernels and establish a pathwise large deviation principle with total mass being the rate. As an application, the rate function for the number of surviving particles as well as the optimal evolution trajectory are calculated exactly for the constant, sum, and product kernels. For the product kernel, we argue that the second derivative of the rate function has a discontinuity. The theoretical results agree with simulations tailored to the calculation of rare events.

Lattice models for ballistic aggregation: Cluster-shape-dependent exponents

We study ballistic aggregation on a two-dimensional square lattice, where particles move ballistically in between momentum and mass conserving coalescing collisions. Three models are studied based on the shapes of the aggregates: In the first the aggregates remain point particles, in the second they retain the fractal shape at the time of collision, and in the third they assume a spherical shape. The exponents describing the power-law temporal decay of number of particles and energy as well as dependence of velocity correlations on mass are determined using large-scale Monte Carlo simulations. It is shown that the exponents are universal only for the point-particle model. In the other two cases, the exponents are dependent on the initial number density and correlations vanish at high number densities. The fractal dimension for the second model is close to 1.49.

Scale Symmetry of Stochastic Surface Clustering under Plasma Influence in Fusion Devices

Titanium, tungsten, carbon, lithium, and beryllium surface structure were analyzed after plasma irradiation in fusion devices. Exceptional extreme high-temperature plasma load in fusion devices leads to specific surface clustering. It is strictly different from any other conditions of material’s clustering. The hierarchical granularity with cauliflower-like shape and surface self-similarity have been observed. Height’s distribution is deviated from the Gaussian function. The relief roughness differs qualitatively from the ordinary Brownian surface and from clustering under other conditions. In fusion devices, the specific conditions regulate material surface clustering faced to plasma. Ions and clusters melt on the surface and move under the effect of stochastic electromagnetic field driven by the near-wall turbulent plasma. In such a process, long-term correlations lead to the growth of surface with a self-similar structure. The multiscale synergistic effects influence the self-similarity–fractal growth from nanometers to millimeters. Experimental results illustrate universality of stochastic clustering of materials irradiated with plasma in fusion devices.

Condensation and intermittency in an open-boundary aggregation-fragmentation model

We study real space condensation in aggregation-fragmentation models where the total mass is not conserved, as in phenomena such as cloud formation and intracellular trafficking. We study the scaling properties of the system with influx and outflux of mass at the boundaries using numerical simulations, supplemented by analytical results in the absence of fragmentation. The system is found to undergo a phase transition to an unusual condensate phase, characterized by strong intermittency and giant fluctuations of the total mass. A related phase transition also occurs for biased movement of large masses, but with some crucial differences which we highlight.

Driven Brownian coagulation of polymers

We present an analysis of the mean-field kinetics of Brownian coagulation of droplets and polymers driven by input of monomers which aims to characterize the long time behavior of the cluster size distribution as a function of the inverse fractal dimension, a, of the aggregates. We find that two types of long time behavior are possible. For 0≤a<1/2 the size distribution reaches a stationary state with a power law distribution of cluster sizes having exponent 3/2. The amplitude of this stationary state is determined exactly as a function of a. For 1/2<a≤1, the cluster size distribution never reaches a stationary state. Instead a bimodal distribution is formed in which a narrow population of small clusters near the monomer scale is separated by a gap (where the cluster size distribution is effectively zero) from a population of large clusters which continue to grow for all time by absorbing small clusters. The marginal case, a=1/2, is difficult to analyze definitively, but we argue that the cluster size distribution becomes stationary and there is a logarithmic correction to the algebraic tail.

Solution of the stochastic Langevin equations for clustering of particles in random flows in terms of the Wiener path integral

We propose to take advantage of using the Wiener path integrals as the formal solution for the joint probability densities of coupled Langevin equations describing particles suspended in a fluid under the effect of viscous and random forces. Our obtained formal solution, giving the expression for the Lyapunov exponent, (i) will provide the description of all the features and the behavior of such a system, e.g., the aggregation phenomenon recently studied in the literature using appropriate approximations, (ii) can be used to determine the occurrence and the nature of the aggregation-nonaggregation phase transition which we have shown for the one-dimensional case, and (iii) allows the use of a variety of approximative methods appropriate for the physical conditions of the problem such as instanton solutions in the WKB approximation in the aggregation phase for the one-dimensional case as presented in this paper. The use of instanton approximation gives the same result for the Lyapunov exponent in the aggregation phase, previously obtained by other authors using a different approximative method. The case of nonaggregation is also considered in a certain approximation using the general path integral expression for the one-dimensional case.

Aggregation-fragmentation processes and decaying three-wave turbulence

We use a formal correspondence between the isotropic three-wave kinetic equation and the rate equations for a nonlinear fragmentation-aggregation process to study the wave frequency power spectrum of decaying three-wave turbulence in the infinite capacity regime. We show that the transient spectral exponent is lambda+1 , where lambda is the degree of homogeneity of the wave interaction kernel and derive a formula for the decay amplitude. When lambda=0 the transient exponent coincides with the thermodynamic equilibrium exponent leading to logarithmic corrections to scaling which we calculate explicitly for the case of constant interaction kernel.

Constant flux relation for diffusion-limited cluster-cluster aggregation

In a nonequilibrium system, a constant flux relation (CFR) expresses the fact that a constant flux of a conserved quantity exactly determines the scaling of the particular correlation function linked to the flux of that conserved quantity. This is true regardless of whether mean-field theory is applicable or not. We focus on cluster-cluster aggregation and discuss the consequences of mass conservation for the steady state of aggregation models with a monomer source in the diffusion-limited regime. We derive the CFR for the flux-carrying correlation function for binary aggregation with a general scale-invariant kernel and show that this exponent is unique. It is independent of both the dimension and of the details of the spatial transport mechanism, a property which is very atypical in the diffusion-limited regime. We then discuss in detail the "locality criterion" which must be satisfied in order for the CFR scaling to be realizable. Locality may be checked explicitly for the mean-field Smoluchowski equation. We show that if it is satisfied at the mean-field level, it remains true over some finite range as one perturbatively decreases the dimension of the system below the critical dimension, d_{c}=2 , entering the fluctuation-dominated regime. We turn to numerical simulations to verify locality for a range of systems in one dimension which are, presumably, beyond the perturbative regime. Finally, we illustrate how the CFR scaling may break down as a result of a violation of locality or as a result of finite size effects and discuss the extent to which the results apply to higher order aggregation processes.

Multiscaling of correlation functions in single species reaction-diffusion systems

We derive the multi-scaling of probability distributions of multi-particle configurations for the binary reaction-diffusion system in A + A --> O in d < or =2 and for the ternary system in 3A --> O in d=1. For the binary reaction we find that the probability Pt(N, Delta V) of finding N particles in a fixed volume element Delta V at time t decays in the limit of large time as (ln t/t)N(ln t)-N(N-1)/2 for d=2 and t-Nd/2 t-N(N-1)epsilon/4+O(epsilon2) for d<2. Here epsilon=2-d. For the ternary reaction in one dimension we find that Pt(N, delta V) approximately (ln t/t)N/2(ln t)-N(N-1)(N-2)/6 . The principal tool of our study is the dynamical renormalization group. We compare predictions of epsilon expansions for Pt(N, Delta V) for a binary reaction in one dimension against the exact known results. We conclude that the epsilon corrections of order two and higher are absent in the previous answer for Pt(N, Delta V) for N=1, 2, 3, 4. Furthermore, we conjecture the absence of epsilon2 corrections for all values of N.