We present a unified treatment for both weak and strong friction — including the turnover regime — of Kramers' Fokker-Planck model for activated rate processes. No recourse to a specific microscopic model (à la Grabert et al.) or Langevin dynamics (à la Graham) will be made. Upon...

The calculation of the Kapitza boundary resistance between dissimilar harmonic solids has since long (Little [Can. J. Phys. 37 (1959) 334]) suffered from a paradox: this resistance erroneously tends to a finite value in the limit of identical solids. We resolve this paradox by calculating...

The real-time dynamics of the asymmetric two-state system weakly interacting with a thermal environment is derived in a rather simple yet novel manner in the Heisenberg picture. Through second order in the coupling coefficients general formulae are obtained (i) for the quantum coherence...

In this paper we embark once more on the current discussion concerning the appropriate expression for the Lagrangian occurring in the action in the functional integral representation of continuous Markov processes. The equivalent differential equation representation of diffusion processes, that...

The classical noise activated equilibration process for a particle moving in a metastable potential well is considered as an eigenproblem. The smallest nonzero real eigenvalue of Kramers' Fokker-Planck model is evaluated analytically by means of Rayleigh's quotient. The treatment allows both for...

The exact dynamical solution is given for a harmonically bound particle of finite size (the oscillator) coupled rigidly to a finitely extended two-dimensional mechanical continuum transmission line (the membrane). A quantum mechanical ultraviolet divergence in the particle's momentum...

The dynamical problem of a harmonically bound nonrelativistic electron with standard dipole model coupling to the electromagnetic field in a finite region of three-dimensional space is solved exactly in a simple and (in the realm) novel manner. The emphasis is on a Lagrangian real space...