Related papers: Phase Transitions in "Small" Systems - A Challenge…
The microscopic model in which nodes interacting with each other are statistical systems is introduced. The nodes conditions are connected with a string of distinct microscopic configurations and depend on external parameters (pressure and…
Stochastic thermodynamics is a framework for describing non-equilibrium processes at the level of fluctuating trajectories, where the state of a system evolves as a stochastic time series, allowing thermodynamic quantities such as work,…
This work presents a general unifying theoretical framework for quantum non-equilibrium systems. It is based on a re-statement of the dynamical problem as one of inferring the distribution of collision events that move a system toward…
A new point of view about the deep origin of thermodynamic phase transitions is sketched. The main idea is to link the appearance of phase transitions to some major topology change of suitable submanifolds of phase space instead of linking…
In order to better understand the occurrence of phase transitions, we adopt an approach based on the study of energy landscapes: The relation between stationary points of the potential energy landscape of a classical many-particle system…
Phase transitions are a fundamental concept in science describing diverse phenomena ranging from, e.g., the freezing of water to Bose-Einstein condensation. While the concept is well-established in equilibrium, similarly fundamental…
At low temperature a thermodynamic system undergoes a phase transition when a physical parameter passes through a singularity point of the free energy, corresponding to formation of a new order. At high temperature the thermal fluctuations…
Dynamical system properties give rise to effects in Statistical Mechanics. Topological index changes can be the basis for phase transitions. The Euler characteristic is a versatile topological invariant that can be evaluated for model…
A microscopic understanding of the thermodynamic entropy in quantum systems has been a mystery ever since the invention of quantum mechanics. In classical physics, this entropy is believed to be the logarithm of the volume of phase space…
The relation between saddle points of the potential of a classical many-particle system and the analyticity properties of its thermodynamic functions is studied. For finite systems, each saddle point is found to cause a nonanalyticity in…
We study two small quantum systems coupled to the same reservoir which is in thermal equilibrium. By studying the particle density and the energy density in the two systems before and after they contact each other, we find that the two…
Conventional thermo-statistics address infinite homogeneous systems within the canonical ensemble. However, some 150 years ago the original motivation of thermodynamics was the description of steam engines, i.e. boiling water. Its essential…
Conventional thermo-statistics address infinite homogeneous systems within the canonical ensemble. However, some 170 years ago the original motivation of thermodynamics was the description of steam engines, i.e. boiling water. Its essential…
Entropy might be a not well defined concept if the system can undergo transformations involving stationary nonequilibria. It might be analogous to the heat content (once called ``caloric'') in transformations that are not isochoric (i.e.…
We introduce a systematic classification method for the analogs of phase transitions in finite systems. This completely general analysis, which is applicable to any physical system and extends towards the thermodynamic limit, is based on…
A few decades after Hill's work on nano-thermodynamics, the development of a thermodynamic framework, to account consistently for the fluctuations of small systems due to their interactions with the surrounding environment, is still…
The theory of small-system thermodynamics was originally developed to extend the laws of thermodynamics to length scales of nanometers. Here we review this "nanothermodynamics," and stress how it also applies to large systems that subdivide…
We present a unified approach to thermodynamic description of one, two and three dimensional phases and phase transformations among them. The approach is based on a rigorous definition of a phase applicable to thermodynamic systems of any…
A way to construct Boltzmann entropy, i.e., the entropy as a function of a microscopic pure state, for quantum field systems is proposed. Operators that shift the field in wavevector space are used in the construction. By employing an…
We examine the question of whether the formal expressions of equilibrium statistical mechanics can be applied to time independent non-dissipative systems that are not in true thermodynamic equilibrium and are nonergodic. By assuming the…