Some rigorous results for the Greenberg-Hastings model (Q1181409)

The Greenberg-Hastings model [see \textit{J. M. Greenberg} and \textit{S. P. Hastings}, SIAM J. Appl. Math. 34, 515-523 (1978; Zbl 0398.92004)] is a simplified model for cells in an excitable medium. The state space is \(X=\{0,1,2\}^{Z^ d}\), \(d\in N^*\), where any \(x\in Z^ d\) represents a cell, which can be excited (1), tired (2), or rested (0). The following deterministic time dynamics on \(X\) is considered: an excited cell is always tired at the next moment, a tired cell always becomes rested, while a rested cell becomes excited if and only if at least one of its \(2d\) neighbours is excited. Although the transition mechanism is completely deterministic, a stochastic process is obtained by starting with an initial probability distribution on \(X\) and letting the system evolve. Denote by \(\eta_ n(x)\) the state of the cell \(x\) at time \(n\). First, it is proved that, if \(d=1\), \[ \hbox {Prob}(\eta_ n(0)=1)\sim(2/(27\pi n))^{1/2}\hbox { and Prob}(\eta_ n(0)\neq 0)\sim(8/(27\pi n))^{1/2}, \] which, in turn, implies that \(\eta_ n\to 0\) in distribution as \(n\to\infty\). In order to identify among the many stationary distributions of the process \((\eta_ n)_{n\in N}\) some with special properties, the notion of topological entropy of the transformation \(T\), \(T: \eta_ 0\to\eta_ 1\), is introduced and computed. The second part (Sections 4 and 5) is devoted to studying the behaviour of the process \((\eta_ n)_{n\in N}\) in the case \(d\geq 2\). Without entering into details, let us only notice that the behaviour of the system, in the case \(d\geq 2\), is much different from that in the case \(d=1\).