title: Lifespan method as a tool to study criticality in absorbing-state phase transitions.
abstract: In a recent work, a new numerical method (the lifespan method) has been introduced to study the critical properties of epidemic processes on complex networks [M. Boguñá, C. Castellano, and R. Pastor-Satorras, Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 068701 (2013)]. Here, we present a detailed analysis of the viability of this method for the study of the critical properties of generic absorbing-state phase transitions in lattices. Focusing on the well-understood case of the contact process, we develop a finite-size scaling theory to measure the critical point and its associated critical exponents. We show the validity of the method by studying numerically the contact process on a one-dimensional lattice and comparing the findings of the lifespan method with the standard quasistationary method. We find that the lifespan method gives results that are perfectly compatible with those of quasistationary simulations and with analytical results. Our observations confirm that the lifespan method is a fully legitimate tool for the study of the critical properties of absorbing phase transitions in regular lattices.
authors.affiliation: Departamento de Física, Universidade Federal de Viçosa, 36571-000 Viçosa, Minais Gerais, Brazil.|Departament de Física i Enginyeria Nuclear, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Campus Nord B4, 08034 Barcelona, Spain.
authors.forename: Angélica S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Mata
authors.affiliation: Departament de Física Fonamental, Universitat de Barcelona, Martí i Franquès 1, 08028 Barcelona, Spain.
authors.forename: Marian
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Boguñá
authors.affiliation: Istituto dei Sistemi Complessi (ISC-CNR), via dei Taurini 19, I-00185 Roma, Italy.|Dipartimento di Fisica, "Sapienza" Università di Roma, Piazzale Aldo Moro 2, I-00185 Roma, Italy.
authors.forename: Claudio
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Castellano
authors.affiliation: Departament de Física i Enginyeria Nuclear, Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Campus Nord B4, 08034 Barcelona, Spain.
authors.forename: Romualdo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Pastor-Satorras