Onsager symmetry from mesoscopic time reversibility and the hydrodynamic dispersion tensor for coarse-grained systems

Eirik G. Flekkøy (1) , Steven R Pride (2) , Renaud Toussaint (3)

1 Department of Physics [Oslo]
2 LBNL - Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory [Berkeley]
3 IPGS - Institut de physique du globe de Strasbourg

Onsager reciprocity relations derive from the fundamental time reversibility of the underlying microscopic equations of motion. This gives rise to a large set of symmetric cross-coupling phenomena. We here demonstrate that different reciprocity relations may arise from the notion of mesoscopic time reversibility, i.e., reversibility of intrinsically coarse-grained equations of motion. We use Brownian dynamics as an example of such a dynamical description and show how it gives rise to reciprocity in the hydrodynamic dispersion tensor as long as the background flow velocity is reversed as well.

Mots clés: dispersion; porous; media; Onsager symmetry; flow

Domaines: Mécanique statistique [cond-mat.stat-mech]

Eirik G. Flekkøy, Steven R Pride, Renaud Toussaint. Onsager symmetry from mesoscopic time reversibility and the hydrodynamic dispersion tensor for coarse-grained systems. Physical Review E , 2017, 95 (2), pp.371 - 381. ⟨10.1103/PhysRevE.95.022136⟩. ⟨hal-01628870⟩