Negative Specific Heat, the Thermodynamic Limit, and Ergodicity

Author(s)
Walter Thirring, Heide Narnhofer, Harald Posch
Abstract

A study is performed on thermodynamic stability, the positivity of the specific heat in the microcanonical ensemble. It is found that the thermodynamical stability is not an automatic consequence of the thermodynamic limit. Results showed that the energy shell in phase space has some ergodic components with a negative specific heat, if the system is not ergodic.

Organisation(s)
Computational and Soft Matter Physics
Journal
Physical Review Letters
Volume
91
No. of pages
4
ISSN
0031-9007
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.91.130601
Publication date
2003
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
103036 Theoretical physics
Portal url
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/b6bf3a49-862b-4fd7-ab97-352b9645fef1