Irreversibility of mesoscopic processes with hydrodynamic interactions

TL;DR

This study investigates how hydrodynamic interactions affect irreversibility and entropy production in optically confined colloidal particles, revealing that coarse-graining can reverse the perceived influence of these interactions on nonequilibrium behavior.

Contribution

It uncovers the impact of coarse-graining on entropy production measurements and clarifies that hydrodynamic interactions do not violate energy balance at the trajectory level.

Findings

Coarse-graining reverses the dependence of entropy production on hydrodynamic interactions.

Hydrodynamic interactions do not violate energy conservation at the trajectory level.

The nonequilibrium features depend on external driving and coarse-graining level.

Abstract

Optically confined colloidal particles, when placed in close proximity, form a dissipatively coupled system through hydrodynamic interactions. The role of such interactions influencing irreversibility and energy dissipation in out-of-equilibrium systems is often not well deciphered. Here, we demonstrate - through the estimation of the entropy production rate - that the nonequilibrium features of the system with such interactions vary depending on the nature of external driving, and importantly, on the level of coarse-graining. Crucially, we show that coarse-graining reverses the dependence of the measured entropy production rate on the strength of the hydrodynamic interactions. Furthermore, we clarify that such interactions do not violate energy balance at the level of individual trajectories, as was believed earlier. Our results highlight a previously unnoticed effect of coarse-graining in nonequilibrium systems, and have implications for the inference of entropy production in experimental contexts.