Numerical simulation of N-vector spin models in a magnetic field

Three-dimensional N-vector spin models may define universality classes for such diverse phenomena as i) the superfluid transition in liquid helium (currently investigated in the micro-gravity environment of the Space Shuttle) and ii) the transition from hadronic matter to a quark-gluon plasma, studied in heavy-ion collisions at the laboratories of Brookhaven and CERN. The models have been extensively studied both by field-theoretical and by statistical mechanical methods, including Monte Carlo simulations using cluster algorithms. These algorithms are applicable also in the presence of a magne...