2018/11/30 by Stefano Iubini, Liviu F. Chirondojan, Liviu Chirondojan +4
Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Adiabatic process #Breather #Classical mechanics #Conjecture #Mathematics #Nonlinear Photonic Systems #Nonlinear system #Physics #Quantum mechanics #Relaxation (psychology) #Spectroscopy and Quantum Chemical Studies #Statistical mechanics #Statistical physics #Strong Light-Matter Interactions #Thermalisation #cond-mat.stat-mech
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevlett.122.084102
published as Phys. Rev. Lett. 122, 084102 (2019) · Corrected some misprints. Version accepted for publication in Physical Review Letters. Supplementary material is included
arxiv created 2019/03/01 · openalex publication_date 2019/03/01 · arxiv updated 2019/03/04 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We provide evidence of an extremely slow thermalization occurring in the discrete nonlinear Schrödinger model. At variance with many similar processes encountered in statistical mechanics-typically ascribed to the presence of (free) energy barriers-here the slowness has a purely dynamical origin: it is due to the presence of an adiabatic invariant, which freezes the dynamics of a tall breather. Consequently, relaxation proceeds via rare events, where energy is suddenly released towards the background. We conjecture that this exponentially slow relaxation is a key ingredient contributing to the nonergodic behavior recently observed in the negative-temperature region of the discrete nonlinear Schrödinger equation.