Clearing-out of dipoles for minimizers of 2-dimensional discrete energies with topological singularities
Year: 2025
Type: article
Abstract: A key question in the analysis of discrete models for material defects, such as vortices in spin systems and superconductors or isolated dislocations in metals, is whether information on boundary energy for a domain can be sufficient for controlling the number of defects in the interior. We present a general combinatorial dipole-removal argument for a large class of discrete models including XY systems and screw dislocation models, allowing to prove sharp conditions under which controlled flux and boundary energy guarantee that minimizers with zero or one charges in the interior exist. The argument uses the max-flow min-cut theorem in combination with an ad-hoc duality for planar graphs, and is robust with respect to changes of the function defining the interaction energies.
Authors: Adriana Garroni, Mircea Petrache, Emanuele Spadaro
Language: English
Subfield: Applied Mathematics
Field: Mathematics
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W4408074405