Arcsine Laws in Stochastic Thermodynamics

Condensed Matter journal club

Arcsine Laws in Stochastic Thermodynamics

  • Event time: 11:30am until 12:30pm
  • Event date: 16th November 2018
  • Location: Room 2511,

Event details

We show that the fraction of time that a thermodynamic current spends above its average value follows

the arcsine law, a prominent result obtained by Levy for Brownian motion. Stochastic currents with long

streaks above or below their average are much more likely than those that spend similar fractions of time

above and below their average. Our result is confirmed with experimental data from a Brownian Carnot

engine. We also conjecture that two other random times associated with currents obey the arcsine law: the

time a current reaches its maximum value and the last time a current crosses its average value. These results

apply to, inter alia, molecular motors, quantum dots, and colloidal systems.

Event resources

About Condensed Matter journal club

Given the diversity of research in the CM group, chosen topics vary widely. We tend to stick to high-impact journals - Nature, Science, PNAS and PRL have been popular - but this is not prescriptive..

Find out more about Condensed Matter journal club.