Abstract
Over the last decade, there has been a growing interest within the physics community in the use of large deviation functions to describe the fluctuations of physical observables. This tools proved especially well-suited to probe transient or non-equilibrium phenomena, for which one lacks a general approach such as the Boltzman-Gibbs thermodynamics of equilibrium.
We present an algorithm to evaluate the large deviation functions associated to history-dependent observables. Instead of relying on a time discretisation procedure to approximate the dynamics, we provide a direct continuous-time algorithm, valuable for systems with multiple time scales. The procedure yields a direct access to typical configurations giving birth to deviations, which we
illustrate on a driven lattice gas.
We also show how the method can be used to probe large deviation functions
in systems with a dynamical phase transition -- revealed in our context through the appearance of a non-analyticity in the large deviation functions and a discontinuity of the (dynamical) order parameter.
Reference: Lecomte V and Tailleur J, J. Stat. Mech. (2007) P03004
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