2392 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.
This paper introduces a general analytical framework for quasi-static quantum Stirling engines operating across ground-state level crossings, demonstrating that they achieve Carnot efficiency without a classical regenerator while exhibiting non-extensive work scaling governed by number-theoretic degeneracies like Fibonacci and Lucas numbers.
This paper demonstrates that the two-dimensional nonlinear sigma model possesses a generic complex conformal field theory fixed point in the complex coupling plane, which is numerically confirmed in non-Hermitian Heisenberg spin chains and can be realized through engineered dissipation to prepare long-range entangled states.
This paper demonstrates that while entropy production due to Joule heating does not arise automatically in an exactly solvable, unitary quantum wire model, it emerges in the limit of frequent local measurements by floating probes, where the resulting decoherence and information acquisition effectively realize the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
This paper introduces a bootstrap framework that utilizes the cross spectral form factor and spectral correlations to systematically reconstruct the full representation theory and identify hidden finite group symmetries in quantum many-body systems, including their character tables and fusion rules, without prior knowledge of the symmetry group.
This paper establishes that the topological gap in spin models, defined as the excess total persistence of the majority-spin alpha complex over a density-matched null, exhibits finite-size scaling governed by the critical exponent and a universal scaling function consistent with 2D Ising universality.
This paper demonstrates that the one-dimensional Mpemba effect in polynomial potentials is driven exclusively by the presence of a sufficiently hard boundary rather than the double-well shape, and is governed by both single-well physics and the high-temperature initial regime.
This paper reports the observation of a phonon thermal Hall effect in crystalline quartz but not in amorphous silica, attributing the phenomenon to the misalignment of energy and entropy currents caused by magnetic-field-induced transverse forces on lattice drift, a mechanism confirmed by the effect's dependence on crystal quality rather than disorder.
This paper proposes a minimal dynamical systems framework demonstrating that the decline in collective sustained attention under digital exposure arises from a continuous, monotonic shift in the cognitive equilibrium caused by external stimulation, rather than from social contagion or abrupt state transitions.
This paper demonstrates that introducing Gaussian spatial correlations into rugged energy landscapes suppresses rare, extreme multi-site traps that otherwise break down Zwanzig's mean-field theory, thereby restoring the predicted exponential scaling of the diffusion coefficient.
This paper presents exact results demonstrating that while anisotropic mass transport processes typically exhibit long-range power-law density correlations decaying as , the additional conservation of the center-of-mass in all directions qualitatively alters this behavior to a faster decay, resulting in extreme hyperuniformity due to higher-order multipolar charge distributions.