Entropy production in nonequilibrium steady states: A different approach and an exactly solvable canonical model

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel approach to studying entropy production in nonequilibrium steady states by sampling system paths at regular intervals, enabling analysis of microscopic irreversibility with an exactly solvable three-state model.

Contribution

It presents a new sampling method for entropy production analysis, demonstrating its equivalence to traditional methods and providing exact solutions for a canonical irreversible system.

Findings

Entropy distribution and large deviation function derived analytically.

Kink in the large deviation function attributed to microscopic irreversibility.

Sampling method applicable to systems with microscopic irreversibility.

Abstract

We discuss entropy production in nonequilibrium steady states by focusing on paths obtained by sampling at regular (small) intervals, instead of sampling on each change of the system's state. This allows us to study directly entropy production in systems with microscopic irreversibility, for the first time. The two sampling methods are equivalent, otherwise, and the fluctuation theorem holds also for the novel paths. We focus on a fully irreversible three-state loop, as a canonical model of microscopic irreversibility, finding its entropy distribution, rate of entropy pr oduction, and large deviation function in closed analytical form, and showing that the widely observed kink in the large deviation function arises solely f rom microscopic irreversibility.