Linear lower bounds for δ c (p) for a class of 2D self-destructive percolation models

The self-destructive percolation model is defined as follows: Consider percolation with parameter p > pc. Remove the infinite occupied cluster. Finally, give each vertex (or, for bond percolation, each edge) that at this stage is vacant, an extra chance δ to become occupied. Let δc(p) be the minimal value of δ, needed to obtain an infinite occupied cluster in the final configuration. This model was introduced by van den Berg and Brouwer. They showed, for the site model on the square lattice (and a few other 2D lattices satisfying a special technical condition) that δc(p) ≥ ${(p-p_{c})\over {p}} $. In particular, δc(p) is at least linear in p - pc. Although the arguments used by van den Berg and Brouwer look very lattice-specific, we show that they can be suitably modified to obtain similar linear lower bounds for δc(p) (with p near pc) for a much larger class of 2D lattices, including bond percolation on the square and triangular lattices, and site percolation on the star lattice (or matching lattice) of the square lattice. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Random Struct. Alg., 2009