Nonvanishing string tension of elastic membrane models
  By using the grand canonical Monte Carlo simulations on spherical surfaces with two fixed vertices separated by the distance L, we find that the second-order phase transition changes to the first-order one when L is sufficiently large. We find that string tension \sigma \not= 0 in the smooth phase while \sigma \to 0 in the wrinkled phase. 
Hiroshi Koibuchi, Nobuyuki Kusano, Atsusi Nidaira, and Komei Suzuki