Gumbel statistics for the longest interval of identical spins in a one-dimensional Gibbs measure

We consider one-dimensional Gibbs measures on spin configurations σ ∈ {–1,+1}^ℤ. For N ∈ ℕ let l _N denote the length of the longest interval of consecutive spins of the same kind in the interval [0,N]. We show that the distribution of a suitable continuous modification l _c (N) of l _N converges to the Gumbel distribution, i.e., for some α, β ∈ (0, ∞) and γ ∈ ℝ, lim _{N →∞} ℙ(l _c (N) ≤ α log N + βx + γ) = e ^{–e –x} . Received: 2 September 2002