Applications in Quantum Statistical Mechanics

浩 市村

Anatoliy K. Prykarpatsky, Ihor V. Mykytiuk

E. Brézin

William C. Schieve, Lawrence Paul Horwitz

Many-body theory stands at the foundation of modern quantum statistical mechanics. It is introduced here to graduate students in physics, chemistry, engineering and biology. The book provides a contemporary understanding of irreversibility, particularly in quantum systems. It explains entropy production in quantum kinetic theory and in the master equation formulation of non-equilibrium statistical mechanics. The first half of the book focuses on the foundations of non-equilibrium statistical mechanics with emphasis on quantum mechanics. The second half of the book contains alternative views of quantum statistical mechanics, and topics of current interest for advanced graduate level study and research. Unique to textbooks on this subject, this book contains a discussion of the fundamental Gleason theorem. Quantum entanglements are treated in application to quantum computation and the difficulties arising from decoherence. The relativistic generalization of the Boltzmann equation is derived, and modern transport applications to reservoir ballistic transport are developed.

David Pierre Ruelle

The language of operator algebras is of great help for the formulation of questions and answers in quantum statistical mechanics. In Chapter 1 we present a minimal mathematical introduction to operator algebras, with physical applications in mind. In Chapter 2 we study some questions related to the quantum statistical mechanics of spin systems, with particular attention to the time evolution of infinite systems. The basic reference for these two chapters is Bratteli-Robinson: Operator algebras and quantum statistical mechanics I, II. In Chapter 3 we discuss the nonequilibrium statistical mechanics of quantum spin systems, as it is currently being developped.