Zero-temperature 2D stochastic Ising model and anisotropic curve-shortening flow (Q2256063)

The model discussed in the paper is a spin system on the lattice \(({\mathcal Z^*})^2,\) where \({\mathcal Z}^*={\mathcal Z}+ 1/2:=\{x+1/2: x\in{\mathcal Z}\}.\) The time dynamics of the model are determined by the continuous time Markov chain on the state space of spin configurations \(\sigma(t):=(\sigma_x(t): x\in ({\mathcal Z^*})^2),\) where \(\sigma_x(t)=+\) or \(-\) for all \(t\geq 0\) denotes the spin at a site \(x\) at time \(t\). The transition rule is a standard one for the two-dimensional Ising model at zero temperature. Namely, the spin at \(x\) is updated independently of other spins with rate one, by letting \(\sigma_x\) equal to the majority of neighboring spins and equal to \(``+"\) and \(``-"\) with probability \(1/2\), in the case when in the neighborhood of \(x\) there are two spins with \(``+"\) and two spins with \(``-"\). The paper is devoted to the proof of the conjecture on the limiting shape of the initial droplet \(D\) of \(``-"\)-s on an infinite square lattice of \(``-"\)-s. The conjecture, first formulated by \textit{I. M. Lifshitz} [``Kinetics of ordering during second order phase transitions'', Sov. Phys., JETP 15, 939--942 (1962); translation from Zhurn. Ehksper. Teor. Fiz. 42, 1354--1359 (1962), \url{http://jetp.ac.ru/cgi-bin/dn/e_015_05_0939.pdf}], states, roughly speaking, that after scaling the space by \(L\) and the time by \(L^2,\) the boundary of the droplet converges to a deterministic curve as \(L\to \infty\). Moreover, at time \(t_f=\frac{| D|}{2},\) where \(| D|\) is the area of the initial droplet, the curve shrinks to a point in the plane. In the present paper, the conjecture is proved under the assumption that the initial droplet is convex.