On the localized phase of a copolymer in an emulsion: Supercritical percolation regime (Q731288)

Consider a self-avoiding random walk path \((S_i)\) of length \(n\) on the two-dimensional integer lattice that is allowed to make steps up, down, and to the right. To each \(i\) independently assign a type \(A\) or \(B\) with probability \(1/2\). This is a model for a directed random copolymer with building block types \(A\) and \(B\). Now, separate the lattice in square blocks of side length \(L_n\) with \(1\ll L_n\ll n\). Each block is assigned independently a type \(A\) or \(B\), type \(A\) with probability \(p\in(0,1)\). These blocks are considered as a random environment for the copolymer and it is assumed that \(A\) blocks of the copolymer prefer to be in \(A\) blocks of the environment and \(B\) blocks prefer \(B\) blocks. Each \(A\)-\(A\) match or \(B\)-\(B\) match gets an energetic bonus of size \(\alpha\) or \(\beta\), respectively. The quantities \((\alpha,\beta)\in\mathbb{R}^2\), \(\alpha\geq|\beta|\) are parameters of the model. Assume that \(p\) is greater than or equal to the critical value of directed bond percolation. In [\textit{F. Den Hollander} and \textit{S. G. Whittington}, Theory Probab. Appl. 51, No. 1, 101--141 (2007; Zbl 1119.82048)], it was shown that for large values of \(\alpha\) (larger than some \(\alpha^*\)) and sufficiently large values of \(\beta\) (larger than some \(\beta_c(\alpha)\)), the copolymer tries to stay at the interface of \(A\) and \(B\) phases of the environment to minimize its energy (partially localized phase) while for smaller values of \(\beta\), the entropy effect dominates and the copolymer delocalizes in the infinite \(A\)-cluster of the environment. In the paper under review, the authors show that the map \(\alpha\mapsto\beta_c(\alpha)\) is strictly increasing, the phase transition is of second order and the free energy is infinitely differentiable throughout the partially localized phase.