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The Biswas-Chatterjee-Sen (BChS) model of opinion dynamics has been studied on three-dimensional Solomon networks by means of extensive Monte Carlo simulations. Finite-size scaling relations for different lattice sizes have been used in order to obtain the relevant quantities of the system in the thermodynamic limit. From the simulation data it is clear that the BChS model undergoes a second-order phase transition. At the transition point, the critical exponents describing the behavior of the order parameter, the corresponding order parameter susceptibility, and the correlation length, have been evaluated. From the values obtained for these critical exponents one can confidently conclude that the BChS model in three dimensions is in a different universality class to the respective model defined on one- and two-dimensional Solomon networks, as well as in a different universality class as the usual Ising model on the same networks.

The three-dimensional classical Heisenberg model on a simple cubic lattice with Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (DM) interactions between nearest-neighbors in all directions has been studied using Monte Carlo simulations. The Metropolis algorithm, combined with single histogram reweighting techniques and finite-size scaling analyses, has been used to obtain the thermodynamic behavior of the system in the thermodynamic limit. Simulations were performed with the same set of interaction parameters for both shifted boundary conditions (SBC) and fluctuating boundary conditions (FBC). Because of an incommensurability caused by the DM interaction, the SBC incorporated a fixed shift angle at the boundary which varies as a function of the DM interaction and lattice size. This SBC method decreases the simulation time significantly, but the distribution of states is somewhat different than that obtained with FBC. The ground state for nonzero DM interaction is a spiral configuration where the spins are restricted to lie in planes perpendicular to the DM vector. We found that this spiral configuration undergoes a conventional second-order phase transition into a disordered, paramagnetic state with the transition temperature being a function of the magnitude of the DM interaction. The limiting case with only DM interaction in the model has also been considered. The critical exponent ν, the critical exponent ratios α/ν, β/ν, γ/ν, as well as the critical temperature T_{c} and fourth-order cumulant of the order parameter U_{4}^{*} at T_{c} have been estimated for different magnitudes of DM interaction. The critical exponents and cumulants at the transition are different from those for the three-dimensional Heisenberg model, but the ratios α/ν, β/ν, γ/ν, U_{4}^{*}/ν are the same, implying that weak universality is valid for all values of DM interaction. Structure factor calculations for particular cases have been performed considering SBC and FBC in the simulations with different lattice sizes at the critical temperatures.

The quantum spin-1/2 Ising ladder with homogeneous side rail interaction and disordered rung interaction in the presence of a random site transverse magnetic field has been studied using the method of recurrence relations in the high-temperature limit. The first six recurrants have been exactly calculated, and a linear extrapolation process has been used to obtain a total of 100 recurrants. This extrapolation allows us to extend the analysis to longer times. Both the rung coupling and the transverse field obey a bimodal distribution. The time autocorrelation functions of the z-component dynamic spin variable have been obtained. We have considered several cases of rung and transverse field distributions, as well as several values of the Hamiltonian parameters. The results show that the disorder present in the rung interaction and external transverse field affects the behavior of the temporal autocorrelation and the spectral functions in all studied cases. In addition, the interesting case where the rung interactions and the transverse magnetic field are correlated has also been studied. In general, transition in the dynamics of the system from individual to collective mode was observed depending on the dominant kind of interaction in the sites, that is, whether most of the sites were subject to a strong external field or strong interchain local interactions.

The spin-1/2 quantum transverse Ising model, defined on a ladder structure, with nearest-neighbor and four-spin interaction on a plaquette, was studied by using exact diagonalization on finite ladders together with finite-size-scaling procedures. The quantum phase transition between the ferromagnetic and paramagnetic phases has then been obtained by extrapolating the data to the thermodynamic limit. The critical transverse field decreases as the antiferromagnetic four-spin interaction increases and reaches a multicritical point. However, the exact diagonalization approach was not able to capture the essence of the dimer phase beyond the multicritical transition.

We investigate the critical behavior of the two-dimensional spin-1 Baxter-Wu model in the presence of a crystal-field coupling Δ with the goal of determining the universality class of transitions along the second-order part of the transition line as one approaches the putative location of the multicritical point. We employ extensive Monte Carlo simulations using two different methodologies: (i) a study of the zeros of the energy probability distribution, closely related to the Fisher zeros of the partition function, and (ii) the well-established multicanonical approach employed to study the probability distribution of the crystal-field energy. A detailed finite-size scaling analysis in the regime of second-order phase transitions in the (Δ,T) phase diagram supports previous claims that the transition belongs to the universality class of the four-state Potts model. For positive values of Δ, we observe the presence of strong finite-size effects, indicative of crossover effects due to the proximity of the first-order part of the transition line. Finally, we demonstrate how a combination of cluster and heat-bath updates allows one to equilibrate larger systems, and we demonstrate the potential of this approach for resolving the ambiguities observed in the regime of Δ≳0.

A discrete version of opinion dynamics systems, based on the Biswas-Chatterjee-Sen (BChS) model, has been studied on Barabási-Albert networks (BANs). In this model, depending on a pre-defined noise parameter, the mutual affinities can assign either positive or negative values. By employing extensive computer simulations with Monte Carlo algorithms, allied with finite-size scaling hypothesis, second-order phase transitions have been observed. The corresponding critical noise and the usual ratios of the critical exponents have been computed, in the thermodynamic limit, as a function of the average connectivity. The effective dimension of the system, defined through a hyper-scaling relation, is close to one, and it turns out to be connectivity-independent. The results also indicate that the discrete BChS model has a similar behavior on directed Barabási-Albert networks (DBANs), as well as on Erdös-Rènyi random graphs (ERRGs) and directed ERRGs random graphs (DERRGs). However, unlike the model on ERRGs and DERRGs, which has the same critical behavior for the average connectivity going to infinity, the model on BANs is in a different universality class to its DBANs counterpart in the whole range of the studied connectivities.

The two-dimensional XY model with Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction has been studied through extensive Monte Carlo simulations. A hybrid algorithm consisting of single-spin Metropolis and Swendsen-Wang cluster-spin updates has been employed. Single histogram techniques have been used to obtain the thermodynamic variables of interest and finite-size-scaling analysis has led to the phase transition behavior in the thermodynamic limit. Fluctuating boundary conditions have been utilized in order to match the incommensurability between the spin structures and the finite lattice sizes due to the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction. The effects of the fluctuating boundary conditions have been analyzed in detail in both commensurate and incommensurate cases. The Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless transition temperature has been obtained as a function of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction and the results are in excellent agreement with the exact equation for the transition line. The spin-spin correlation function critical exponent has been computed as a function of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction and temperature. In the incommensurate cases, optimal sizes for the finite lattices and the distribution of the boundary shift angle have been extracted. Analysis of the low temperature configurations and the corresponding vortex-antivortex pairs have also been addressed in some regions of the phase diagram.

A generalization of the original Gibbs phase rule is proposed in order to study the presence of single phases, multiphase coexistence, and multicritical phenomena in lattice spin magnetic models. The rule is based on counting the thermodynamic number of degrees of freedom, which strongly depends on the external fields needed to break the ground state degeneracy of the model. The phase diagrams of some spin Hamiltonians are analyzed according to this general phase rule, including general spin Ising and Blume-Capel models, as well as q -state Potts models. It is shown that by properly taking into account the intensive fields of the model in study, the generalized Gibbs phase rule furnishes a good description of the possible topology of the corresponding phase diagram. Although this scheme is unfortunately not able to locate the phase boundaries, it is quite useful to at least provide a good description regarding the possible presence of critical and multicritical surfaces, as well as isolated multicritical points.

The thermodynamic properties of the spin S=3/2 ferromagnetic Ising model in the presence of transverse and longitudinal crystal fields (equivalent to the Blume-Capel model with a transverse crystal field) have been studied by using two different approaches: (i) a zero-temperature mapping of the system onto a spin-1/2 quantum Ising model in longitudinal and transverse fields, together with time-independent quantum perturbation theory; and (ii) a standard mean-field approximation within the framework of the Bogoliubov inequality for the free energy. A very rich phase diagram, with different kinds of multicritical behavior, has been obtained. The results show first- and second-order transition lines, tricritical and tetracritical points, critical end points with a two-phase coexistence, double critical end points, and also double noncritical end points. Additionally, the behavior of the magnetization as a function of temperature, over a wide range of values of both longitudinal and transverse crystal fields, has also been analyzed in detail. While large magnitudes of the longitudinal crystal field select the z-spin components either in their states ±3/2 or ±1/2, it is surprising that a large transverse crystal field induces the spin component in the z direction to values ±1, which are completely different from any expected natural component. This comes indeed as a result of the zero-temperature mapping of the ground state with the superposition of the states 3/2 and -1/2, in one sector of the Hilbert space, and the states -3/2 and 1/2 on the other disjoint sector of the Hilbert space. This superposition for a large transverse crystal field prevails even for finite temperatures, implying that the exact critical points are obtained for the model on the one-dimensional lattice and the two-dimensional square lattice, and quite accurate estimates can be achieved for the three-dimensional simple cubic lattice.

The spin-1/2 Hamiltonian for two coupled isosceles Heisenberg triangles, which is well suited for describing the V_{6}-type magnetic molecules, is studied by exact diagonalization. The quantum phase transition diagram, at zero temperature, is obtained as a function of the theoretical parameters. The zero temperature magnetization is also obtained as a function of the external magnetic field. The thermodynamic behavior of the magnetization, entropy, susceptibility, and specific heat, as a function of temperature, are also computed and the corresponding magnetocaloric effect analyzed for various values of the Hamiltonian parameters.

Polymer chains undergoing a continuous adsorption-desorption transition are studied through extensive computer simulations. A three-dimensional self-avoiding walk lattice model of a polymer chain grafted onto a surface has been treated for different solvent conditions. We have used an advanced contact-density chain-growth algorithm, in which the density of contacts can be directly obtained. From this quantity, the order parameter and its fourth-order Binder cumulant are computed, as well as the corresponding critical exponents and the adsorption-desorption transition temperature. As the number of configurations with a given number of surface contacts and monomer-monomer contacts is independent of the temperature and solvent conditions, it can be easily applied to get results for different solvent parameter values without the need of any extra simulations. In analogy to continuous magnetic phase transitions, finite-size-scaling methods have been employed. Quite good results for the critical properties and phase diagram of very long single polymer chains have been obtained by properly taking into account the effects of corrections to scaling. The study covers all solvent effects, going from the limit of super-self-avoiding walks, characterized by effective monomer-monomer repulsion, to poor solvent conditions that enable the formation of compact polymer structures.

The Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya (DM) interaction in magnetic models is the result of a combination of superexchange and spin-orbital coupling, and it can give rise to rich phase-transition behavior. In this paper, we study ferromagnetic XY models with the DM interaction on two-dimensional L×L square lattices using a hybrid Monte Carlo algorithm. To match the incommensurability between the resultant spin structure and the lattice due to the DM interaction, a fluctuating boundary condition is adopted. We also define a different kind of order parameter and use finite-size scaling to study the critical properties of this system. We find that a Kosterlitz-Thouless-like phase transition appears in this system and that the phase-transition temperature shifts toward higher temperature with increasing DM interaction strength.

The XY vectorial generalization of the Blume-Emery-Griffiths (XY-VBEG) model, which is suitable to be applied to the study of ^{3}He-^{4}He mixtures, is treated on thin films structure and its thermodynamical properties are analyzed as a function of the film thickness. We employ extensive and up-to-date Monte Carlo simulations consisting of hybrid algorithms combining lattice-gas moves, Metropolis, Wolff, and super-relaxation procedures to overcome the critical slowing down and correlations among different spin configurations of the system. We also make use of single histogram techniques to get the behavior of the thermodynamical quantities close to the corresponding transition temperatures. Thin films of the XY-VBEG model present a quite rich phase diagram with Berezinskii-Kosterlitz-Thouless (BKT) transitions, BKT endpoints, and isolated critical points. As one varies the impurity concentrations along the layers, and in the limit of infinite film thickness, there is a coalescence of the BKT transition endpoint and the isolated critical point into a single, unique tricritical point. In addition, when mimicking the behavior of thin films of ^{3}He-^{4}He mixtures, one obtains that the concentration of ^{3}He atoms decreases from the outer layers to the inner layers of the film, meaning that the superfluid particles tend to locate in the bulk of the system.

Advanced chain-growth computer simulation methodologies have been employed for a systematic statistical analysis of the critical behavior of a polymer adsorbing at a substrate. We use finite-size scaling techniques to investigate the solvent-quality dependence of critical exponents, critical temperature, and the structure of the phase diagram. Our study covers all solvent effects from the limit of super-self-avoiding walks, characterized by effective monomer-monomer repulsion, to poor solvent conditions that enable the formation of compact polymer structures. The results significantly benefit from taking into account corrections to scaling.

The phase diagram and the critical behavior of the spin-1 and the spin-3/2 two-dimensional Baxter-Wu model in a crystal field are studied by conventional finite-size scaling and conformal invariance theory. The phase diagram of this model, for the spin-1 case, is qualitatively the same as those of the diluted 4-states Potts model and the spin-1 Blume-Capel model. However, for the present case, instead of a tricritical point one has a pentacritical point for a finite value of the crystal field, in disagreement with previous work based on finite-size calculations. On the other hand, for the spin-3/2 case, the phase diagram is much richer and can present, besides a pentacritical point, an additional multicritical end point. Our results also support that the universality class of the critical behavior of the spin-1 and spin-3/2 Baxter-Wu model in a crystal field is the same as the pure Baxter-Wu model, even at the multicritical points.

We study the effects of next-nearest-neighbor (NNN) interactions on the dynamics of the one-dimensional spin-1/2 transverse Ising model in the high-temperature limit. We use exact diagonalization to obtain the time-dependent transverse correlation function and the corresponding spectral density for a tagged spin. Our results for chains of 13 spins with periodic boundary conditions produce results which are valid in the infinite-size limit. In general we find that the NNN coupling produces slower dynamics accompanied by an enhancement of the central mode behavior. Even in the case of a strong transverse field, if the NNN coupling is sufficiently large, then there is a crossover from collective mode to central mode behavior. We also obtain several recurrants for the continued fraction representation of the relaxation function.

The critical properties of the spin-1 Blume-Capel model in two dimensions is studied on Voronoi-Delaunay random lattices with quenched connectivity disorder. The system is treated by applying Monte Carlo simulations using the heat-bath update algorithm together with single histograms re-weighting techniques. We calculate the critical temperature as well as the critical exponents as a function of the crystal field Δ. It is found that this disordered system exhibits phase transitions of first- and second-order types that depend on the value of the crystal field. For values of Δ≤3, where the nearest-neighbor exchange interaction J has been set to unity, the disordered system presents a second-order phase transition. The results suggest that the corresponding exponent ratio belongs to the same universality class as the regular two-dimensional ferromagnetic model. There exists a tricritical point close to Δt=3.05(4) with different critical exponents. For Δt≤Δ<3.4 this model undergoes a first-order phase transition. Finally, for Δ≥3.4 the system is always in the paramagnetic phase.

The bicritical properties of the three-dimensional classical anisotropic Heisenberg model in a crystal field are investigated through extensive Monte Carlo simulations on a simple cubic lattice, using Metropolis and Wolff algorithms. Field-mixing and multidimensional histogram techniques were employed in order to compute the probability distribution function of the extensive conjugate variables of interest and, using finite-size scaling analysis, the first-order transition line of the model was precisely located. The fourth-order cumulant of the order parameter was then calculated along this line and the bicritical point located with good precision from the cumulant crossings. The bicritical properties of this point were further investigated through the measurement of the universal probability distribution function of the order parameter. The results lead us to conclude that the studied bicritical point belongs in fact to the three-dimensional Heisenberg universality class.

The ground-state properties of the quasi-one-dimensional spin-1/2 antiferromagnetic Heisenberg model is investigated by using a variational method. Spins on chains along the x direction are antiferromagnetically coupled with exchange J>0, while spins between chains in the y direction are coupled either ferromagnetically (J' < 0) or antiferromagnetically (J' > 0). The staggered and the colinear antiferromagnetic magnetizations are computed and their dependence on the anisotropy parameter λ=|J'|/J is analyzed. It is found that an infinitesimal interchain coupling parameter is sufficient to stabilize a long-range order with either a staggered magnetization m&#95;{s} (J' > 0) or a colinear antiferromagnetic magnetization m&#95;{caf} (J' < 0), both behaving as ≃λ¹/² for λ → 0.

A variational approach based on Bogoliubov inequality for the free energy is employed in order to treat the quantum spin-1 anisotropic ferromagnetic Heisenberg model in the presence of a crystal field. Within the Bogoliubov scheme an improved pair approximation has been used. The temperature-dependent thermodynamic functions have been obtained and provide much better results than the previous simple mean-field scheme. In one dimension, which is still nonintegrable for quantum spin-1, we get the exact results in the classical limit, or near-exact results in the quantum case, for the free energy, magnetization, and quadrupole moment, as well for the transition temperature. In two and three dimensions the corresponding global phase diagrams have been obtained as a function of the parameters of the Hamiltonian. First-order transition lines, second-order transition lines, tricritical and tetracritical points, and critical endpoints have been located through the analysis of the minimum of the Helmholtz free energy and a Landau-like expansion in the approximated free energy. Only first-order quantum transitions have been found at zero temperature. Limiting cases, such as isotropic Heisenberg, Blume-Capel, and Ising models, have been analyzed and compared to previous results obtained from other analytical approaches as well as from Monte Carlo simulations.

The p-state clock model is studied, for general values of p , from simulations using a heat-bath single spin flipping Monte Carlo method, and a mapping of the corresponding spinlike configurations to a solid-on-solid growth model. The growth exponents are calculated. From the dynamics generated by this far from equilibrium kinetic roughening of the surface one is able to characterize the corresponding equilibrium magnetic properties of the original model, such as the high temperature Berezinskii-Koserlitz-Thouless (BKT) transitions, the low-temperature long-range ordered phase transitions, as well as the conventional second-order phase transitions. The present method suggests that for p>or=5 the high-temperature phase transition is indeed a BKT one, whose value is the same as that for p-->infinity ( XY model), while the low-temperature phase transition has a first-order character.

The phase diagram of the Ising model in the presence of nearest- and next-nearest-neighbor interactions on a simple cubic lattice is studied within the framework of the differential operator technique. The Hamiltonian is solved by employing an effective-field theory with finite clusters consisting of a pair of spins. A functional form is also proposed for the free energy, similar to the Landau expansion, in order to obtain the phase diagram of the model. The transition from the ferromagnetic (or antiferromagnetic) phase to the disordered paramagnetic phase is of second order. On the other hand, a first-order transition is obtained from the lamellar phase to the paramagnetic phase, as well as from the lamellar phase to the ferromagnetic (or antiferromagnetic) phase, with the presence of a critical end point. An expected singular behavior of the first-order line at the critical end point is also obtained.

We present extensive Monte Carlo spin-dynamics simulations of the vector Blume-Emery-Griffiths model with three-dimensional spins on a simple cubic lattice and periodic boundary conditions. For a range of Hamiltonian parameters, this model reproduces the phase diagram topology of the one experimentally observed for bulk mixtures of 3He-4He . Highly efficient decomposition time integration algorithms have been used to obtain the evolution of the equations of motion from which we have computed the dynamic structure factor S(q,omega) close to critical and tricritical points. The dispersion relation and the corresponding dynamic exponents have been obtained in the critical and multicritical transitions. We find that the dynamic critical exponents for in-plane and out-of-plane fluctuations are the same at the tricritical point but are in fact different along the critical line.

In this work, we evaluate the probability distribution function of the order parameter for the two-dimensional site-diluted Ising model. Extensive Monte Carlo simulations have been performed for different spin concentrations p (0.70

We present an analysis of mapped surfaces obtained from configurations of two classical statistical-mechanical spin models in the square lattice: the q -state Potts model and the spin-1 Blume-Capel model. We carry out a study of the phase transitions in these models using the Monte Carlo method and a mapping of the spin configurations to a solid-on-solid growth model. The first- and second-order phase transitions and the tricritical point happen to be relevant in the kinetic roughening of the surface growth process. At the low and high temperature phases the roughness W grows indefinitely with the time, with growth exponent beta(w) approximately 0.50(W approximately tbeta(w)) . At criticality the growth presents a crossover at a characteristic time tc, from a correlated regime (with beta(w) ++ 0.50 ) to an uncorrelated one (beta(w) approximately equal 0.50) . We also calculate the Hurst exponent H of the corresponding surfaces. At criticality, beta(w) and H have values characteristic of correlated growth, distinguishing second- from first-order phase transitions. It has also been shown that the Family-Vicsek relation for the growth exponents also holds for the noise-reduced roughness with an anomalous scaling.

We carry out a study of the two-dimensional Blume-Capel model using the Wang-Landau Monte Carlo method which estimates the density of states g(E) directly. This work validates the applicability of this method to multiparametric systems, since only one computer run is needed for all range of macroscopic parameters (temperature, anisotropy, etc.). The location of the tricritical point is determined as kBTt/J=0.609(3), Dt/J=1.966(2), and is in excellent agreement with previous estimates. The free energy and the entropy, which are not directly accessible by conventional Monte Carlo simulations, are obtained simply using g(E).

A version of the Vector Blume-Emery-Griffiths model with three-dimensional spins was studied on a simple cubic lattice by Monte Carlo simulations. We obtained the phase diagram, which reproduces, for a range of the parameters of the model, the topology of the one observed for bulk mixtures of 3He--4He. The phase diagram displays a superfluid, 4He-rich phase which undergoes a phase transition to a normal phase. This transition is first or second order, depending on the region of the phase diagram examined. One of the main features of this diagram is the existence of a tricritical point, which, for some values of the parameters of the model, decomposes into a critical endpoint and a double critical endpoint. These points were located with reasonable precision. This study provides the basis for the subsequent study of dynamic properties of 3He--4He mixtures.

In this work we apply a highly efficient Monte Carlo algorithm recently proposed by Newman and Ziff to treat percolation problems. The site and bond percolations are studied on a number of lattices in two and three dimensions. Quite good results for the wrapping probabilities, correlation length critical exponent, and critical concentration are obtained for the square, simple cubic, hexagonal close packed, and hexagonal lattices by using relatively small systems. We also confirm the universal aspect of the wrapping probabilities regarding site and bond dilution.

A double critical end point in the two-dimensional spin-3/2 Blume-Capel model is studied via extensive Monte Carlo simulations. The resultant scaling character of the probability distribution of the mixing scaling operators allows us to locate the double critical end point precisely and also to convincingly show that it indeed belongs to the same universality class as the critical points.

We show that addition of Metropolis single spin flips to the Wolff cluster-flipping Monte Carlo procedure leads to a dramatic increase in performance for the spin-1/2 Ising model. We also show that adding Wolff cluster flipping to the Metropolis or heat bath algorithms in systems where just cluster flipping is not immediately obvious (such as the spin-3/2 Ising model) can substantially reduce the statistical errors of the simulations. A further advantage of these methods is that systematic errors introduced by the use of imperfect random-number generation may be largely healed by hybridizing single spin flips with cluster flipping.