We study the effect of metastability onto boundary induced phase transitions in a driven lattice gas. The phase diagram for open systems, parametrized by the input and output rates, consists of two regions corresponding to the free flow and jammed phase. Both have been entirely characterized. The microscopic states in the high density phase are shown to have an interesting striped structure, which undergoes a coarsening process and survives in the thermodynamic limit.

• Received 6 April 2000

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.86.2498