🔬 Category

cond-mat.stat-mech

2356 papers

Statistical mechanics explores how the chaotic motion of countless tiny particles gives rise to the predictable laws governing heat, pressure, and phase transitions. This field bridges the gap between the microscopic world of atoms and the macroscopic reality we experience daily, offering deep insights into why materials behave the way they do.

On Gist.Science, we process every new preprint in this category as it appears on arXiv to make these complex findings accessible to everyone. For each paper, we provide both a plain-language explanation for the curious reader and a detailed technical summary for specialists, ensuring that groundbreaking research is never lost behind a wall of jargon.

Below are the latest papers in statistical mechanics, freshly curated and summarized to help you understand the cutting edge of this fascinating discipline.

🔬 condensed matter

Gap-controlled thermalization in a SSH model version of the Fermi-Pasta-Ulam-Tsingou chain

This study demonstrates that in a dimerized Fermi-Pasta-Ulam-Tsingou chain, the acoustic-optical band gap acts as a tunable, momentum-selective filter for nonlinear energy transport, where a sharp isolation threshold emerges at half-maximum dimerization due to the onset of specific umklapp processes that either activate or suppress long-time thermalization depending on whether the gap permits three-wave scattering.

José A. Aké, Gerardo G. Naumis2026-09-10
🔬 condensed matter

Topological instability and reentrant crystallization in active solids

This paper extends KTHNY theory to active solids with non-reciprocal elasticity and Cosserat coupling, revealing that beyond a critical activity threshold, melting occurs via a zero-temperature topological instability driven by defect proliferation, followed by a surprising reentrant crystallization phase where order persists at temperatures that would melt equilibrium crystals.

Zory Davoyan, Aditya Jha, Anton Souslov2026-09-10
🔬 condensed matter

The Role of Concentration in Determining NaCl Nucleation Mechanism: A Story of Pathways Coexistence

Using unbiased path sampling (∞\inftyRETIS) across varying supersaturations, this study reveals that NaCl nucleation involves a continuous coexistence of one-step and two-step-like pathways within a single reaction channel, where the probability of amorphous aggregation prior to crystallization increases with concentration, thereby reconciling previous contradictory mechanistic reports.

Porhouy Minh, Sapna Sarupria2026-09-10
🔬 condensed matter

Quantifying cell shape and density fluctuations in epithelial tissue in vivo

This study presents a theoretical framework modeling epithelial cells as interacting soft ellipsoids to derive continuum stochastic equations that, when validated against *Drosophila* pupal wing data, quantify critical parameters like effective tissue stiffness and active cell shape changes through spatial-temporal correlation functions.

Jake Turley, Helen Weavers, Paul Martin, Isaac V. Chenchiah, Tanniemola B. Liverpool2026-09-10
🔬 condensed matter

Infinite ergodic theory and functional statistics of non-confined Feller process

This paper establishes that the local-time field of a non-confined Feller process with infinite mean return times factorizes in the long-time limit into a spatial profile governed by a non-normalizable stationary density and temporal fluctuations controlled by a Mittag-Leffler amplitude, thereby providing a unifying framework for infinite ergodic theory under state-dependent multiplicative noise.

Vicenç Méndez2026-09-10
🔢 mathematics

Universal correlations in the Abelian sandpile model

This paper presents a large-scale numerical study of bulk correlation functions in the two-dimensional Abelian sandpile model across square, honeycomb, and kagome lattices using Wilson's algorithm and the Majumdar–Dhar bijection, confirming logarithmic conformal field theory predictions and providing the first systematic analysis for the kagome lattice alongside a new analytical derivation for its height-1 probability.

Qiyu Liu, Jan-Niklas Herre, Prajit Baruah, Sebastian Dreizler, Christoph Karrasch, Wioletta Ruszel, Dirk Schuricht2026-09-10
🔬 materials science

Quantifying translational and bond-orientational order metrics in hyperuniform and nonhyperuniform many-particle systems

This paper introduces a bond-orientational order metric τO\tau_O to complement the translational order metric τT\tau_T, demonstrating through analysis of hard-particle, random sequential addition, and stealthy hyperuniform systems that while bond-orientational order is generally subdominant to translational order, the two metrics are positively correlated and reveal distinct, preparation-dependent structural trajectories.

Anirban Mukherjee, Salvatore Torquato2026-09-10