English

A nonequilibrium equality for free energy differences

Statistical Mechanics 2009-10-28 v1 Biological Physics Chemical Physics Computational Physics

Abstract

An expression is derived for the classical free energy difference between two configurations of a system, in terms of an ensemble of finite-time measurements of the work performed in parametrically switching from one configuration to the other. Two well-known equilibrium identities emerge as limiting cases of this result.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.cond-mat/9610209,
  title  = {A nonequilibrium equality for free energy differences},
  author = {C. Jarzynski},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cond-mat/9610209},
  year   = {2009}
}

Comments

Latex, 11 pages, no figures