Eur. Phys. J. B 19, 565-582 (2001)
https://doi.org/10.1007/s100510170302

Order-parameter fluctuations (OPF) in spin glasses: Monte Carlo simulations and exact results for small sizes

¹ LPTHE, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, Paris VI, Université Denis Diderot, Paris VII, Boite 126, Tour 16, 1er étage, 4 place Jussieu, 75252 Paris Cedex 05, France
² Departament de Física Fonamental, Facultat de Física, Universitat de Barcelona, Diagonal 647, 08028 Barcelona, Spain

Corresponding author: ^a msales@ffn.ub.es

Received: 20 September 2000
Revised: 10 January 2001
Published online: 15 February 2001

Abstract

The use of parameters measuring order-parameter fluctuations (OPF) has been encouraged by the recent results reported in referenece [2,3] which show that two of these parameters, G and G_c, take universal values in the . In this paper we present a detailed study of parameters measuring OPF for two mean-field models with and without time-reversal symmetry which exhibit different patterns of replica symmetry breaking below the transition: the Sherrington-Kirkpatrick model with and without a field and the Ising p-spin glass (p=3). We give numerical results and analyze the consequences which replica equivalence imposes on these models in the infinite volume limit. We give evidence for the transition in each system and discuss the character of finite-size effects. Furthermore, a comparative study between this new family of parameters and the usual Binder cumulant analysis shows what kind of new information can be extracted from the finite T behavior of these quantities. The two main outcomes of this work are: 1) Parameters measuring OPF give better estimates than the Binder cumulant for T_c and even for very small systems they give evidence for the transition. 2) For systems with no time-reversal symmetry, parameters defined in terms of connected quantities are the proper ones to look at.