Continuously variable survival exponent for random walks with movable partial reflectors

We study a one-dimensional lattice random walk with an absorbing boundary at the origin and a movable partial reflector. On encountering the reflector at site x, the walker is reflected (with probability r) to x - 1 and the reflector is simultaneously pushed to x + 1. Iteration of the transition matrix, and asymptotic analysis of the probability generating function show that the critical exponent delta governing the survival probability varies continuously between 1/2 and 1 as r varies between 0 and 1. Our study suggests a mechanism for nonuniversal kinetic critical behavior, observed in models with an infinite number of absorbing configurations.