Abstract. We report on the computer study of a lattice system that relaxes from a metastable state. Under appropriate nonequilibrium randomness, relaxation occurs by avalanches, i.e., the model evolution is discontinuous and displays many scales in a way that closely resembles the relaxation in a large number of complex systems in nature. Such apparent scale invariance simply results in the model from summing over many exponential relaxations, each with a scale which is determined by the curvature of the domain wall at which the avalanche originates. The claim that scale invariance in a nonequilibrium setting is to be associated with criticality is therefore not supported. Some hints that may help in checking this experimentally are discussed.

Key words: avalanches (theory)

Received 12 November 2004, accepted for publication 23 January 2006
Published 9 February 2006