Metastability for a non-reversible dynamics: the evolution of the condensate in totally asymmetric zero range processes (Q2509616)

Metastability is a relevant phenomenon in the framework of non-equilibrium statistical mechanics, which occurs in the vicinity of first-order phase transitions. In previous works, the author applied the so-called martingale method to obtain the metastable behaviour of condensing reversible zero-range processes evolving on finite sets. Here, it is shown that these previous results are effective, by proving the metastable behavior of totally asymmetric condensing zero-range processes. The contribution of the paper is due to the fact that the proof of the metastable behavior of non-reversible dynamics exhibits two main differences with respect to the proof for the reversible one.