The two-dimensional Fokker-Planck equation is
with Fokker-Planck probability current
The point initial condition is
where is the Dirac delta function. The reflecting boundary condition for a diffusion is
with the outward unit normal. This zero-flux condition conserves the integral of the probability density function over the square.
Let be independent random variables with the standard normal distribution. The unconstrained Milstein method step is
The noise is additive, so its Milstein correction vanishes. The diagonal, independent noise fields commute, so no cross iterated stochastic integral is required.
Implement each reflecting boundary condition for a diffusion by folding the proposed coordinate back into . One formula that also handles multiple overshoots is
The complete update is
Under the usual smoothness assumptions, the Milstein discretization has strong order of convergence one and weak order of convergence one. The reflection enforces the boundary pathwise.
In this polymerization Brownian ratchet model, a gap of width immediately accommodates one monomer. That event advances the tip by and resets the gap to zero. The threshold is therefore an absorbing boundary condition for a diffusion,
All waiting-time probability lies within , so the steady occupation probability density satisfies
There is a reinjection flux at equal to the absorption flux at . The nonpenetration constraint at zero is a reflecting boundary condition for a diffusion during each individual waiting episode. For the stationary reset process it must not be confused with setting the net current to zero: the source at reset supplies . This is how a normalized steady density can coexist with a nonzero exit flux.
Multiply each time-sliced path weight by . A nonnegative finite is a local killing rate: the Feynman-Kac weight attenuates paths in proportion to the time spent in regions where . Let that rate tend to infinity outside the allowed interval. Paths that exit are removed, leaving Brownian motion killed at its first boundary hit.
Consequently the required kernel is the Gaussian path measure restricted to surviving paths, equivalently
with the infinite-barrier interpretation stated above. It solves in the interior with absorbing Dirichlet boundary conditions at . A reflecting boundary condition for a diffusion would describe a different process.
Strictly, this is a transition probability density in the final position, jointly with survival; a probability for an interval of final positions includes an integral over . Its integral over the whole allowed interval is at most one. It is not the normalized endpoint density conditional on survival, which would require division by the survival probability. In these diffusion units and the eigenvalues of have units of inverse time.