A unifying approach to diffusive transport in heterogeneous media

TL;DR

This paper presents a unifying mathematical framework called Randomly Modulated Gaussian Processes for modeling and analyzing various types of anomalous diffusion in heterogeneous media, aiding experimental classification and interpretation.

Contribution

It introduces a comprehensive framework that generalizes many known anomalous diffusion models and provides tools for their systematic statistical analysis.

Findings

Unified description of known anomalous diffusion models.

Derived expressions for key statistical parameters.

Conditions for the emergence of anomalous diffusion.

Abstract

We introduce the concept of Randomly Modulated Gaussian Processes as a unifying framework for modeling, analyzing and classifying anomalous diffusion models in heterogeneous media. This formulation incorporates correlations in the displacements together with correlated fluctuations of their amplitudes. Most known models of anomalous diffusion (including Continuous-Time Random Walk and fractional Brownian motion) and random diffusivity can be described and generalized within this framework. Moreover, the unified view identifies the main statistical properties to be probed experimentally for a reliable classification of diffusive dynamics. The proposed matrix formulation facilitates the computation of the first four moments and allows for a systematic statistical characterization of the considered processes. The necessary and sufficient conditions are provided for the emergence of anomalous diffusion. General expressions for the non-Gaussian parameter, ergodicity breaking parameter and covariance of squared increments are derived. Biological applications of this framework for systematic analysis and biophysical interpretations of experimental single-particle trajectories are discussed.