Pinned or moving: States of a single shock in a ring.

Totally asymmetric exclusion processes (TASEPs) with open boundaries are known to exhibit moving shocks or delocalized domain walls (DDWs) for sufficiently small equal injection and extraction rates. In contrast, TASEPs in a ring with a single inhomogeneity display pinned shocks or localized domain walls (LDWs) under equivalent conditions [see, e.g., H. Hinsch and E. Frey, Phys. Rev. Lett. 97, 095701 (2006)PRLTAO0031-900710.1103/PhysRevLett.97.095701]. By studying periodic exclusion processes composed of a driven (TASEP) and a diffusive segment, we discuss gradual fluctuation-induced depinning of the LDW, leading to its delocalization and formation of a DDW-like domain wall, similar to the DDWs in open TASEPs in some limiting cases under long-time averaging. This smooth crossover is controlled essentially by the fluctuations in the diffusive segment. Our studies provide an explicit route to control the quantitative extent of domain-wall fluctuations in driven periodic inhomogeneous systems, and should be relevant in any quasi-one-dimensional transport processes where the availability of carriers is the rate-limiting constraint.