This collection of lectures covers a wide range of present day research in thermodynamics and the theory of phase transitions far from equilibrium. The contributions are written in a pedagogical style and present an extensive bibliography to help graduates organize their further studies in this area. The reader will find lectures on principles of pattern formation in physics, chemistry and biology, phase instabilities and phase transitions, spatial and temporal structures in optical systems, transition to chaos, critical phenomena and fluctuations in reaction-diffusion systems, and much more.
Author(s): Katja Lindenberg, David Brown, Xidi Wang (auth.), Luis Garrido (eds.)
Series: Lecture Notes in Physics 319
Edition: 1
Publisher: Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Year: 1988
Language: English
Pages: 340
Tags: Thermodynamics; Statistical Physics; Quantum Computing, Information and Physics; Quantum Physics
A review of current issues in the quantum theory of envelope solitons....Pages 1-28
Fluctuations in the transient dynamics of nonlinear optical systems....Pages 29-43
Theoretical methods in pattern formation in Physics, Chemistry and Biology....Pages 45-74
Two nonequilibrium phase transitions: Stochastic Hopf bifurcation and onset of relaxation oscillations in the diffusive sine-Gordon model....Pages 75-96
Exactly solvable multistable Fokker-Planck models with arbitrarily prescribed N lowest eigenvalues....Pages 97-107
Phase and frequency dynamics in laser instabilities....Pages 108-138
Fluctuations and critical phenomena in reaction-diffusion systems....Pages 139-156
From deterministic chaos to noise in retarded feedback systems....Pages 157-175
Non-local and non-linear problems in the physics of disordered media....Pages 177-193
Convection in binary mixtures propagating and standing patterns....Pages 195-215
Time-dependent phase transitions....Pages 217-235
Quantum treatment of dispersive optical bistability....Pages 237-262
Spontaneous symmetry breaking and spatial structures in optical systems....Pages 263-280
Scaling for an interfacial instability....Pages 281-305
Field theory for growth kinetics....Pages 307-335
