Related papers: The Five Problems of Irreversibility
There is a relation between the irreversibility of thermodynamic processes as expressed by the breaking of time-reversal symmetry, and the entropy production in such processes. We explain on an elementary mathematical level the relations…
One observes that a considerable level of confusion remains about some of those aspects of irreversibility, entropy generation and `the arrow of time' which actually are well understood. This demands that great care must be taken in any…
The approach to the analysis of the dynamic of non-equilibrium open systems within the framework of the laws of classical mechanics on the example a hard-disks is offered. This approach was based on Hamilton and Liouville generalized…
An equation describing the irreversible evolution of the local density of a continuous medium without involving any statistical hypotheses and assumptions is derived. The derivation is based on the smoothing of the microscopic dynamic…
Active matter encompasses systems whose individual consituents dissipate energy to exert propelling forces on their environment. This rapidly developing field harbors a dynamical phenomenology with no counterpart in passive systems. The…
The arrow of time dilemma: the laws of physics are invariant for time inversion, whereas the familiar phenomena we see everyday are not (i.e. entropy increases). I show that, within a quantum mechanical framework, all phenomena which leave…
The 2nd law of thermodynamics yields an irreversible increase in entropy until thermal equilibrium is achieved. This irreversible increase is often assumed to require large and complex systems to emerge from the reversible microscopic laws…
Fundamental laws of physics are symmetric under time reversal ($T$) symmetry, but the $T$ symmetry is strongly broken in the macroscopic world. In this Perspective, I review $T$ symmetry breaking frameworks: \textit{second law of…
We discuss the appearance of time-asymmetric behavior in physical processes in cosmology and in the dynamics of the Universe itself. We begin with an analysis of the nature and origin of irreversibility in well-known physical processes such…
A dynamical system is said to be reversible if, given an output, the input can always be recovered in a well-posed manner. Nevertheless, we argue that reversible systems that have a time-reversal symmetry, such as the Nonlinear…
A kinetic equation is derived for the phase density of a system of point particles, generating a system of integro-differential equations for distribution functions that have a deterministic meaning. The derivation took into account the…
In this essay, we discuss the fine-tuning problems of the Higgs mass and the cosmological constant. We argue that these are indeed legitimate problems, as opposed to some other "problems" that are sometimes described using similar…
The fluctuation relations, which characterize irreversible processes in Nature, are among the most important results in non-equilibrium physics. In short, these relations say that it is exponentially unlikely for us to observe a…
Molecular Dynamics and Statistical Mechanics make possible a particle-based understanding of Thermodynamics and Hydrodynamics, including the fascinating Loschmidt contradiction between time-reversible atomistic mechanics and the…
Quantifying irreversibility of a system using finite information constitutes a major challenge in stochastic thermodynamics. We introduce an observable that measures the time-reversal asymmetry between two states after a given time lag. Our…
Rabi oscillations have long been thought to be out of reach in simulations using time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT), a prominent symptom of the failure of the adiabatic approximation for non-perturbative dynamics. We present a…
The logical structure and the basic theorems of time-dependent current density functional theory (TDCDFT) are analyzed and reconsidered from the point of view of recently proposed time-dependent deformation functional theory (TDDefFT). It…
Classical dynamical density functional theory (DDFT) has become one of the central modeling approaches in nonequilibrium soft matter physics. Recent years have seen the emergence of novel and interesting fields of application for DDFT. In…
For classical many-body systems subject to Brownian dynamics we develop a superadiabatic dynamical density functional theory (DDFT) for the description of inhomogeneous fluids out-of-equilibrium. By explicitly incorporating the dynamics of…
This article aims at revisiting, with the aid of simple and neat numerical examples, some of the basic features of macroscopic irreversibility, and, thus, of the mechanical foundation of the second principle of thermodynamics as drawn by…