Mathematical physics sits at the fascinating intersection where abstract equations meet the fundamental laws of our universe. This field uses rigorous mathematical tools to model everything from the behavior of subatomic particles to the curvature of spacetime, turning complex theories into testable predictions. It is the language through which physicists describe reality, bridging the gap between pure mathematics and physical observation.

On Gist.Science, we process every new preprint published in this category on arXiv to make these dense studies accessible to everyone. Whether you are a specialist or a curious reader, you will find both plain-language overviews and detailed technical summaries for each paper. Below are the latest mathematical physics papers from arXiv, curated to help you explore the cutting edge of theoretical science.

Approach to equilibrium for a particle interacting with a harmonic thermal bath

This paper investigates the long-time approach to equilibrium for a harmonic oscillator coupled to a large chain of oscillators, demonstrating that while the system exhibits thermalization-like behavior at leading order in the coupling strength, higher-order corrections reveal persistent oscillations and power-law decays that prevent the bath from being accurately modeled as a simple stochastic thermostat.

Federico Bonetto, Alberto Mario Maiocchi2026-04-21🔢 math-ph

Entanglement Entropy of a Non-Minimally Coupled Self-Interacting Scalar across a Schwarzschild Horizon at O(α)\mathcal{O}(\alpha)

This paper computes the first-order correction in quartic coupling to the entanglement entropy of a non-minimally coupled massive scalar across a Schwarzschild horizon, demonstrating that the resulting divergences are renormalized by bulk mass and Newton's constant counterterms while the finite correction vanishes for conformal coupling.

Florin Manea2026-04-21⚛️ gr-qc

Continuum honeycomb Schrödinger operators with incommensurate line defects

This paper develops a rigorous framework for analyzing wave propagation in 2D honeycomb structures with irrational line defects by exploiting quasiperiodicity to construct approximate edge states via a 3D embedding and a resolvent expansion, revealing that such non-commensurate geometries support infinitely many edge states with energies dense in the bulk spectral gap.

Pierre Amenoagbadji, Michael I. Weinstein2026-04-21🔢 math-ph

On the Energy Dissipation in the Landau-Lifshitz-Gilbert Equation

This paper systematically analyzes the dependence of ferromagnetic resonance frequency, damping, and quality factor on local energy curvature in ferromagnetic nanomagnets, highlighting how the standard quality factor approximation fails near bifurcation points where the number of metastable energy minima changes.

Kutay Kulbak, Mohamed Iyad Boualem, Charlie Masse, Mariana Delalibera de Toledo, Vasily V. Temnov2026-04-21🔬 cond-mat.mtrl-sci

Causality from Projection and Hardy-Space Analyticity of Non-Markovian Memory Kernels

This paper rigorously establishes that Nakajima-Zwanzig memory kernels for open quantum systems with factorized initial states and continuous bath spectra belong to the Hardy space, thereby proving the validity of Kramers-Kronig dispersion relations and providing new theorems linking analyticity to physical constraints like complete positivity and stability, while demonstrating that correlated initial states can break this analyticity and lead to acausal dynamics.

Kejun Liu2026-04-21🔢 math-ph