text: Presented on October 2, 2017 at 11:00 a.m. in the Klaus Advanced Computing Building, room 1116E.
  @cite_18: 
  @cite_42: Various finite volume mixing conditions in classical statistical mechanics are reviewed and critically analyzed. In particular somefinite size conditions are discussed, together with their implications for the Gibbs measures and for the approach to equilibrium of Glauber dynamics inarbitrarily large volumes. It is shown that Dobrushin-Shlosman's theory ofcomplete analyticity and its dynamical counterpart due to Stroock and Zegarlinski, cannot be applied, in general, to the whole one phase region since it requires mixing properties for regions ofarbitrary shape. An alternative approach, based on previous ideas of Oliveri, and Picco, is developed, which allows to establish results on rapid approach to equilibrium deeply inside the one phase region. In particular, in the ferromagnetic case, we considerably improve some previous results by Holley and Aizenman and Holley. Our results are optimal in the sene that, for example, they show for the first time fast convergence of the dynamicsfor any temperature above the critical one for thed-dimensional Ising model with or without an external field. In part II we extensively consider the general case (not necessarily attractive) and we develop a new method, based on renormalizations group ideas and on an assumption of strong mixing in a finite cube, to prove hypercontractivity of the Markov semigroup of the Glauber dynamics.
  @cite_27: We consider the two-dimensional stochastic Ising model in finite square Λ with free boundary conditions, at inverse temperature β>β0 and zero external field. Using duality and recent results of Ioffe on the Wulff construction close to the critical temperature, we extend some of the results obtained by Martinelli in the low-temperature regime to any temperature below the critical one. In particular we show that the gap in the spectrum of the generator of the dynamics goes to zero in the thermodynamic limit as an exponential of the side length of Λ, with a rate constant determined by the surface tension along one of the coordinate axes. We also extend to the same range of temperatures the result due to Shlosman on the equilibrium large deviations of the magnetization with free boundary conditions.
  @cite_40: We prove that for finite range discrete spin systems on the two dimensional latticeZ2, the (weak) mixing condition which follows, for instance, from the Dobrushin-Shlosman uniqueness condition for the Gibbs state implies a stronger mixing property of the Gibbs state, similar to the Dobrushin-Shlosman complete analyticity condition, but restricted to all squares in the lattice, or, more generally, to all sets multiple of a large enough square. The key observation leading to the proof is that a change in the boundary conditions cannot propagate either in the bulk, because of the weak mixing condition, or along the boundary because it is one dimensional. As a consequence we obtain for ferromagnetic Ising-type systems proofs that several nice properties hold arbitrarily close to the critical temperature; these properties include the existence of a convergent cluster expansion and uniform boundedness of the logarithmic Sobolev constant and rapid convergence to equilibrium of the associated Glauber dynamics on nice subsets ofZ2, including the full lattice.
  @cite_45: We develop a new method, based on renormalization group ideas (block decimation procedure), to prove, under an assumption of strong mixing in a finite cube Λ 0 , a Logarithmic Sobolev Inequality for the Gibbs state of a discrete spin system. As a consequence we derive the hypercontractivity of the Markov semigroup of the associated Glauber dynamics and the exponential convergence to equilibrium in the uniform norm in all volumes Λ «multiples» of the cube Λ 0
  @cite_25: The Ising model is widely regarded as the most studied model of spin-systems in statistical physics. The focus of this paper is its dynamic (stochastic) version, the Glauber dynamics, introduced in 1963 and by now the most popular means of sampling the Ising measure. Intensive study throughout the last three decades has yielded a rigorous understanding of the spectral-gap of the dynamics on ( Z ^2 ) everywhere except at criticality. While the critical behavior of the Ising model has long been the focus for physicists, mathematicians have only recently developed an understanding of its critical geometry with the advent of SLE, CLE and new tools to study conformally invariant systems.
summary: The critical slowdown picture of Glauber dynamics for the 2D Ising model is by now fairly well understood. For @math , the dynamics on an @math torus has @math via the work of Martinelli and Olivieri @cite_42 @cite_45 and Martinelli, Olivieri and Schonmann @cite_40 , showing that, in this regime, there is a uniform bound on the inverse gap (in fact under arbitrary boundary conditions; see [ .7] Martinelli97 ). That this dynamics has @math at any @math for some @math was shown by Chayes, Chayes and Schonmann @cite_18 , and thereafter with the sharp @math by Cesi @cite_27 . Finally, a polynomial upper bound on @math at @math was given in the aforementioned paper @cite_25 ; establishing the correct (believed to be universal and approximately @math ; cf. @cite_25 and its references) remains a challenging open problem.