Glauber dynamics

In statistical physics, Glauber dynamics is a way to simulate the Ising model (a model of magnetism) on a computer. It is a type of Markov Chain Monte Carlo algorithm.
The algorithm.
In the Ising model, we have say N particles that can spin up (+1) or down (-1). Say the particles are on a 2D grid. We label each with an x and y coordinate. Glauber's algorithm becomes:
This tries to approximate how the spins change over time. The fancy term is that it is part of nonequilibrium statistical mechanics, which roughly studies the time-dependent behavior of statistical mechanics.
History.
The algorithm is named after Roy J. Glauber, Nobel Prize winner and a Harvard physicist who worked at Los Alamos.