Search for: All records

Hard disks systems are often considered as prototypes for simple fluids. In a statistical mechanics context, the hard disk configuration space is generally quotiented by the action of various symmetry groups. The changes in the topological and geometric properties of the configuration spaces effected by such quotient maps are studied for small numbers of disks on a square and hexagonal torus. A metric is defined on the configuration space and the various quotient spaces that respects the desired symmetries. This is used to construct explicit triangulations of the configuration spaces as$$\alpha$$$\alpha$-complexes. Critical points of the hard disk potential on a configuration space are associated with changes in the topology of the accessible part of the configuration space as a function of disk radius, are conjectured to be related to the configurational entropy of glassy systems, and could reveal the origins of phase transitions in other systems. The number of critical points and their topological and geometric properties are found to depend on the symmetries by which the configuration space is quotiented.

 

Abstract Statistical thermodynamics is valuable as a conceptual structure that shapes our thinking about equilibrium thermodynamic states. A cloud of unresolved questions surrounding the foundations of the theory could lead an impartial observer to conclude that statistical thermodynamics is in a state of crisis though. Indeed, the discussion about the microscopic origins of irreversibility has continued in the scientific community for more than a hundred years. This paper considers these questions while beginning to develop a statistical thermodynamics for finite non-equilibrium systems. Definitions are proposed for all of the extrinsic variables of the fundamental thermodynamic relation that are consistent with existing results in the equilibrium thermodynamic limit. The probability density function on the phase space is interpreted as a subjective uncertainty about the microstate, and the Gibbs entropy formula is modified to allow for entropy creation without introducing additional physics or modifying the phase space dynamics. Resolutions are proposed to the mixing paradox, Gibbs’ paradox, Loschmidt’s paradox, and Maxwell’s demon thought experiment. Finally, the extrinsic variables of the fundamental thermodynamic relation are evaluated as functions of time and space for a diffusing ideal gas, and the initial and final values are shown to coincide with the expected equilibrium values.