MathSciDoc: An Archive for Mathematician ∫

Recent studies have shown that the entropy production rate for the master equation consists of two nonnegative terms: the adiabatic and non-adiabatic parts, where the non-adiabatic part is also known as the dissipation rate of a Boltzmann-Shannon relative entropy. In this paper, we provide some nonzero lower bounds for the relative entropy, the entropy production rate, and its adiabatic and non-adiabatic parts. These nonzero lower bounds not only reveal some novel dissipative properties for general nonequilibrium processes which are much stronger than the second law of thermodynamics, but also impose some new constraints on thermodynamic constitutive relations. Moreover, we also provide a mathematical application of these nonzero lower bounds by studying the long-time behavior of the master equation. Extensions to the Tsallis statistics are also discussed, including the nonzero lower bounds for the Tsallis-type relative entropy and its dissipation rate.

We report on transport properties of the super-honeycomb lattice, the band structure of which possesses a flat band and Dirac cones, according to the tight-binding approximation. This super-honeycomb model combines the honeycomb lattice and the Lieb lattice and displays the properties of both. The super-honeycomb lattice also represents a hybrid fermionic and bosonic system, which is rarely seen in nature. By choosing the phases of input beams properly, the flat-band mode of the super-honeycomb will be excited and the input beams will exhibit strong localization during propagation. On the other hand, if the modes of Dirac cones of the super-honeycomb lattice are excited, one will observe conical diffraction. Furthermore, if the input beam is properly chosen to excite a sublattice of the super-honeycomb lattice and the modes of Dirac cones with different pseudospins, e.g., the three-beam interference pattern, the pseudospin-mediated vortices will be observed.

The seek for a new universal formulation for describing various non-equilibrium processes is a central task of modern non-equilibrium thermodynamics. In this paper, a novel steady-state thermodynamic formalism was established for general Markov processes described by the Chapman-Kolmogorov equation. Furthermore, corresponding formalisms of steady-state thermodynamics for master equation and Fokker-Planck equation could be rigorously derived in mathematics. To be concrete, we proved that: 1) in the limit of continuous time, the steady-state thermodynamic formalism for the Chapman-Kolmogorov equation fully agrees with that for the master equation; 2) a similar one-to-one correspondence could be established rigorously between the master equation and Fokker-Planck equation in the limit of large system size; 3) when a Markov process is restrained to one-step jump, the steady-state thermodynamic formalism for the Fokker-Planck equation with discrete state variables also goes to that for master equations, as the discretization step gets smaller and smaller. Our analysis indicated that, with respect to the steady state, general Markov processes admit a unified and self-consistent non-equilibrium thermodynamic formulation, regardless of underlying detailed models.

The Onsager's reciprocal relation plays a fundamental role in the nonequilibrium thermodynamics. However, unfortunately, its classical version is valid only within a narrow region near equilibrium due to the linear regression hypothesis, which largely restricts its usage. In this paper, based on the conservation-dissipation formalism, a generalized version of Onsager's relations for the master equations and Fokker-Planck equations was derived. Nonlinear constitutive relations with nonsymmetric and positively stable operators, which become symmetric under the detailed balance condition, constitute key features of this new generalization. Similar conclusions also hold for many other classical models in physics and chemistry, which in turn make the current study as a benchmark for the application of generalized Onsager's relations in nonequilibrium thermodynamics.

Photonic graphene, a photonic crystal with honeycomb structures, has been intensively studied in both theoretical and applied fields. Similar to graphene which admits Dirac Fermions and topological edge states, photonic graphene supports novel and subtle propagating modes (edge modes) of electromagnetic waves. These modes have wide applications in many optical systems. In this paper, we propose a novel gradient recovery method based on Bloch theory for the computation of topological edge modes in the honeycomb structure. Compared to standard finite element methods, this method provides higher order accuracy with the help of gradient recovery technique. This high order accuracy is highly desired for constructing the propagating electromagnetic modes in applications. We analyze the accuracy and prove the superconvergence of this method. Numerical examples are presented to show the efficiency by computing the edge mode for the P-symmetry and C-symmetry breaking cases in honeycomb structures.

Consider electromagnetic waves in two-dimensional honeycomb structured media. The properties of transverse electric (TE) polarized waves are determined by the spectral properties of the elliptic operator L^A=-\nabla_x·A(x) \nabla_x, where A(x) is Λ_h− periodic (Λ_h denotes the equilateral triangular lattice), and such that with respect to some origin of coordinates, A(x) is PC− invariant (A(x)=\overline{A(-x)}) and 120° rotationally invariant (A(R*x)=R*A(x)R, where R is a 120° rotation in the plane). We first obtain results on the existence, stability and instability of Dirac points, conical intersections between two adjacent Floquet-Bloch dispersion surfaces. We then show that the introduction through small and slow variations of a domain wall across a line-defect gives rise to the bifurcation from Dirac points of highly robust (topologically protected) edge states. These are time-harmonic solutions of Maxwell's equations which are propagating parallel to the line-defect and spatially localized transverse to it. The transverse localization and strong robustness to perturbation of these edge states is rooted in the protected zero mode of a one-dimensional effective Dirac operator with spatially varying mass term. These results imply the existence of uni-directional propagating edge states for two classes of time-reversal invariant media in which C symmetry is broken: magneto-optic media and bi-anisotropic media. Our analysis applies and extends the tools previously developed in the context of honeycomb Schrödinger operators.

Mathematical analysis on electromagnetic waves in photonic graphene, a photonic topological material which has a honeycomb structure, is one of the most important current research topics. By modulating the honeycomb structure, numerous topological phenomena have been observed recently. The electromagnetic waves in such a media are generally described by the 2-dimensional wave equation. It has been shown that the corresponding elliptic operator with a honeycomb material weight has Dirac points in its dispersion surfaces. In this paper, we study the time evolution of the wave packets spectrally concentrated at such Dirac points in a modulated honeycomb material weight. We prove that such wave packet dynamics is governed by the Dirac equation with a varying mass in a large but finite time. Our analysis provides mathematical insights to those topological phenomena in photonic graphene.

Wave dynamics in topological materials has been widely studied recently. A striking feature is the existence of robust and chiral wave propagations that have potential applications in many fields. A common way to realize such wave patterns is to utilize Dirac points which carry topological indices and is supported by the symmetries of the media. In this work, we investigate these phenomena in photonic media. Starting with Maxwell's equations with a honeycomb material weight as well as the nonlinear Kerr effect, we first prove the existence of Dirac points in the dispersion surfaces of transverse electric and magnetic Maxwell operators under very general assumptions of the material weight. Our assumptions on the material weight are almost the minimal requirements to ensure the existence of Dirac points in a general hexagonal photonic crystal. We then derive the associated wave packet dynamics in the scenario where the honeycomb structure is weakly modulated. It turns out the reduced envelope equation is generally a two-dimensional nonlinear Dirac equation with a spatially varying mass. By studying the reduced envelope equation with a domain-wall-like mass term, we realize the subtle wave motions which are chiral and immune to local defects. The underlying mechanism is the existence of topologically protected linear line modes, also referred to as edge states. However, we show that these robust linear modes do not survive with nonlinearity. We demonstrate the existence of nonlinear line modes, which can propagate in the nonlinear media based on high-accuracy numerical computations. Moreover, we also report a new type of nonlinear modes which are localized in both directions.

Due to the intrinsic complexity and nonlinearity of chemical reactions, direct applications of traditional machine learning algorithms may face with many difficulties. In this study, through two concrete examples with biological background, we illustrate how the key ideas of multiscale modeling can help to reduce the computational cost of machine learning a lot, as well as how machine learning algorithms perform model reduction automatically in a time-scale separated system. Our study highlights the necessity and effectiveness of an integration of machine learning algorithms and multiscale modeling during the study of chemical reactions.

In this paper, we propose an unfitted Nitsche's method to compute the band structures of phononic crystal with impurities of general geometry. The proposed method does not require the background mesh to fit the interfaces of impurities, and thus avoids the expensive cost of generating body-fitted meshes and simplifies the inclusion of interface conditions in the formulation. The quasi-periodic boundary conditions are handled by the Floquet-Bloch transform, which converts the computation of band structures into an eigenvalue problem with periodic boundary conditions. More importantly, we show the well-posedness of the proposed method using a delicate argument based on the trace inequality, and further prove the convergence by the Babuška-Osborn theory. We achieve the optimal convergence rate at the presence of the impurities of general geometry. We confirm the theoretical results by two numerical examples, and show the capability of the proposed methods for computing the band structures without fitting the interfaces of impurities.