Large deviation induced phase switch in an inertial majority-vote model.

We theoretically study noise-induced phase switch phenomena in an inertial majority-vote (IMV) model introduced in a recent paper [Chen et al., Phys. Rev. E 95, 042304 (2017)]. The IMV model generates a strong hysteresis behavior as the noise intensity f goes forward and backward, a main characteristic of a first-order phase transition, in contrast to a second-order phase transition in the original MV model. Using the Wentzel-Kramers-Brillouin approximation for the master equation, we reduce the problem to finding the zero-energy trajectories in an effective Hamiltonian system, and the mean switching time depends exponentially on the associated action and the number of particles N. Within the hysteresis region, we find that the actions, along the optimal forward switching path from the ordered phase (OP) to disordered phase (DP) and its backward path show distinct variation trends with f, and intersect at f = fc that determines the coexisting line of the OP and DP. This results in a nonmonotonic dependence of the mean switching time between two symmetric OPs on f, with a minimum at fc for sufficiently large N. Finally, the theoretical results are validated by Monte Carlo simulations.