Escape by diffusion from a double-well potential across a barrier is studied on the basis of the Smoluchowski equation in one dimension. By comparison with exact results for a piecewise parabolic potential a reduced description is constructed in terms of a set of rate equations for the...

For ergodic adiabatic quantum systems, we study the evolution of energy distribution as the system evolves in time. Starting from the von Neumann equation for the density operator, we obtain the quantum analogue of the Smoluchowski equation on coarse-graining over the energy spectrum. This...

The time-dependence of the occupation probabilities of neighboring wells due to diffusion in one dimension is formulated in terms of a set of generalized rate equations describing transitions between neighboring wells and escape across a final barrier. The equations contain rate coefficients,...

We consider a charged Brownian gas under the influence of external and non-uniform electric, magnetic and mechanical fields, immersed in a non-uniform bath temperature. With the collision time as an expansion parameter, we study the solution to the associated Kramers equation, including a linear...

Non-Markovian effects on the Brownian movement of a free particle in the presence as well as in the absence of inertial force are investigated under the framework of generalized Fokker–Planck equations (Rayleigh and Smoluchowski equations). More specifically, it is predicted that non-Markovian...

A Markovian probabilistic cellular automaton with the capability to capture the essential phenomenology of coalescence and break-up processes in the presence of external agitation is introduced. The existence of homogeneous stationary states of the model which admit large cluster formation for a...

A novel quantum Smoluchowski dynamics in an external, nonlinear potential has been derived recently. In its original form, this overdamped quantum dynamics is not compatible with the second law of thermodynamics if applied to periodic, but asymmetric ratchet potentials. An improved version of...