Moments, moderate and large deviations for a branching process in a random environment

Let (Z_n) be a supercritical branching process in a random environment ξ, and W be the limit of the normalized population size Z_n/E[Z_n|ξ]. We show large and moderate deviation principles for the sequence logZ_n (with appropriate normalization). For the proof, we calculate the critical value for the existence of harmonic moments of W, and show an equivalence for all the moments of Z_n. Central limit theorems on W−W_n and logZ_n are also established.     

A class of asymptotically self-similar stable processes with stationary increments

We generalize the BM-local time fractional symmetric α$\alpha$-stable motion introduced in Cohen and Samorodnitsky (2006) by replacing the local time with a general continuous additive functional (CAF). We show that the resulting process is again symmetric α$\alpha$-stable with stationary increments. Depending on the CAF, the process is either self-similar or lies in the domain of attraction of the BM-local time fractional symmetric α$\alpha$-stable motion. We also show that the process arises as a weak limit of a discrete “random rewards scheme” similar to the one described by Cohen and Samorodnitsky.     

Logarithmic speeds for one-dimensional perturbed random walks in random environments

We study the random walk in a random environment on Z⁺={0,1,2,…}${\mathbb{Z}}^{+}=\{0,1,2,\dots \}$, where the environment is subject to a vanishing (random) perturbation. The two particular cases that we consider are: (i) a random walk in a random environment perturbed from Sinai’s regime; (ii) a simple random walk with a random perturbation. We give almost sure results on how far the random walker is from the origin, for almost every environment. We give both upper and lower almost sure bounds. These bounds are of order (logt)^β${(logt)}^{\beta }$, for β∈(1,∞)$\beta \in (1,\infty )$, depending on the perturbation. In addition, in the ergodic cases, we give results on the rate of decay of the stationary distribution.     

Determinantal martingales and noncolliding diffusion processes

Two aspects of noncolliding diffusion processes have been extensively studied. One of them is the fact that they are realized as harmonic Doob transforms of absorbing particle systems in the Weyl chambers. Another aspect is integrability in the sense that any spatio-temporal correlation function can be expressed by a determinant. The purpose of the present paper is to clarify the connection between these two aspects. We introduce a notion of determinantal martingale and prove that, if the system has determinantal-martingale representation, then it is determinantal. In order to demonstrate the direct connection between the two aspects, we study three processes.     

Sharp critical behavior for pinning models in a random correlated environment

This article investigates the effect for random pinning models of long range power-law decaying correlations in the environment. For a particular type of environment based on a renewal construction, we are able to sharply describe the phase transition from the delocalized phase to the localized one, giving the critical exponent for the (quenched) free-energy, and proving that at the critical point the trajectories are fully delocalized. These results contrast with what happens both for the pure model (i.e., without disorder) and for the widely studied case of i.i.d. disorder, where the relevance or irrelevance of disorder on the critical properties is decided via the so-called Harris Criterion (Harris, 1974) [21].     

Periodic solutions of asymptotically linear autonomous Newtonian systems with resonance

In this paper, we study the existence, continuation and bifurcation from infinity of2π$2\pi$-periodic solutions of autonomous Newtonian systems. We underline that the resonant case is considered. To prove the results, we apply the degree for S¹$S^1$-equivariant gradient maps defined by Rybicki (1994) in [15] and the angle condition introduced by Bartsch and Li (1997) in [16].     

Shift-coupling and a zero-one law for random walk in random environment

This paper discusses several aspects of shift-coupling for random walk in random environment.     

Surviving particles for subcritical branching processes in random environment

The asymptotic behavior of a subcritical Branching Process in Random Environment (BPRE) starting with several particles depends on whether the BPRE is strongly subcritical (SS), intermediate subcritical (IS) or weakly subcritical (WS). In the (SS+IS) case, the asymptotic probability of survival is proportional to the initial number of particles, and conditionally on the survival of the population, only one initial particle survives a.s$a.s$. These two properties do not hold in the (WS) case and different asymptotics are established, which require new results on random walks with negative drift. We provide an interpretation of these results by characterizing the sequence of environments selected when we condition on the survival of particles. This also raises the problem of the dependence of the Yaglom quasistationary distributions on the initial number of particles and the asymptotic behavior of the Q-process associated with a subcritical BPRE.     

Valleys and the Maximum Local Time for Random Walk in Random Environment

Let ξ (n, x) be the local time at x for a recurrent one-dimensional random walk in random environment after n steps, and consider the maximum ξ^*(n) = max _x ξ(n, x). It is known that lim sup is a positive constant a.s. We prove that lim inf is a positive constant a.s. this answers a question of P. Révész [5]. The proof is based on an analysis of the valleys in the environment, defined as the potential wells of record depth. In particular, we show that almost surely, at any time n large enough, the random walker has spent almost all of its lifetime in the two deepest valleys of the environment it has encountered. We also prove a uniform exponential tail bound for the ratio of the expected total occupation time of a valley and the expected local time at its bottom.     

Potential analysis for positive recurrent Markov chains with asymptotically zero drift: Power-type asymptotics

We consider a positive recurrent Markov chain on R⁺${\mathbb{R}}^{+}$ with asymptotically zero drift which behaves like −_c1/x$-c_1/x$ at infinity; this model was first considered by Lamperti. We are interested in tail asymptotics for the stationary measure. Our analysis is based on construction of a harmonic function which turns out to be regularly varying at infinity. This harmonic function allows us to perform non-exponential change of measure. Under this new measure Markov chain is transient with drift like _c2/x$c_2/x$ at infinity and we compute the asymptotics for its Green function. Applying further the inverse transform of measure we deduce a power-like asymptotic behaviour of the stationary tail distribution. Such a heavy-tailed stationary measure happens even if the jumps of the chain are bounded. This model provides an example where possibly bounded input distributions produce non-exponential output.     

Limiting behavior of solutions of subelliptic heat equations

We investigate the behavior, as ε → 0⁺, of ε log w ^ε (t, x) where w ^ε are solutions of a suitable family of subelliptic heat equations. Using the Large Deviation Principle, we show that the limiting behavior is described by the metric inf-convolution w.r.t. the associated Carnot-Carathéodory distance.      

Annealed deviations of random walk in random scenery

Let (Zn)_n∈N be a d-dimensional random walk in random scenery, i.e., with (Sk)_k∈N0 a random walk in Zd and (Y(z))_z∈Zd an i.i.d. scenery, independent of the walk. The walker's steps have mean zero and some finite exponential moments. We identify the speed and the rate of the logarithmic decay of for various choices of sequences n(bn) in [1,∞). Depending on n(bn) and the upper tails of the scenery, we identify different regimes for the speed of decay and different variational formulas for the rate functions. In contrast to recent work [A. Asselah, F. Castell, Large deviations for Brownian motion in a random scenery, Probab. Theory Related Fields 126 (2003) 497-527] by A. Asselah and F. Castell, we consider sceneries unbounded to infinity. It turns out that there are interesting connections to large deviation properties of self-intersections of the walk, which have been studied recently by X. Chen [X. Chen, Exponential asymptotics and law of the iterated logarithm for intersection local times of random walks, Ann. Probab. 32 (4) 2004].     

A mixed-step algorithm for the approximation of the stationary regime of a diffusion

In some recent papers, some procedures based on some weighted empirical measures related to decreasing-step Euler schemes have been investigated to approximate the stationary regime of a diffusion (possibly with jumps) for a class of functionals of the process. This method is efficient but needs the computation of the function at each step. To reduce the complexity of the procedure (especially for functionals), we propose in this paper to study a new scheme, called the mixed-step scheme, where we only keep some regularly time-spaced values of the Euler scheme. Our main result is that, when the coefficients of the diffusion are smooth enough, this alternative does not change the order of the rate of convergence of the procedure. We also investigate a Richardson–Romberg method to speed up the convergence and show that the variance of the original algorithm can be preserved under a uniqueness assumption for the invariant distribution of the “duplicated” diffusion, condition which is extensively discussed in the paper. Finally, we conclude by giving sufficient “asymptotic confluence” conditions for the existence of a smooth solution to a discrete version of the associated Poisson equation, condition which is required to ensure the rate of convergence results.