Eur. Phys. J. B 46, 55-60 (2005)
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2005-00235-y

Experimental determination of KPZ height-fluctuation distributions

Department of Physics, University of Jyväskylä, P.O. Box 35 (YFL), 40014 Jyväskylä, Finland

Corresponding author: ^a lasse.miettinen@phys.jyu.fi

Received: 16 December 2004
Revised: 30 March 2005
Published online: 8 August 2005

Abstract

Height-fluctuation distributions of nonequilibrium interfaces were analyzed using slow-combustion fronts propagating in sheets of paper. All distributions measured were definitely non-Gaussian. The experimental distributions for transient and stationary regimes were well fitted by the theoretical distributions proposed by Prähofer and Spohn in reference [9]. Consistent with the Galilean invariance of the system, the same distributions were found for horizontal fronts and, when determined along the normal to the slope, for fronts with a non-zero average slope.