Abstract :

Fourier's law of heat conduction predicts that heat propagation in a solid is diffusive. Fourier's law is a phenomenological macroscopic law and its derivation ​,​ ​from a microscopic model with Hamiltonian dynamics,​ is an open problem. A large number of studies over the last few decades suggest that this law is in fact not generally valid in low-dimensional systems. It appears that the heat carriers perform super-diffusive Levy walks rather than simple random walks. I will discuss what we presently know about this problem and some of the interesting open questions in this field.

ABOUT THE SPEAKER:

Prof. Dhar is a theoretical physicist working on the theory and applications of nonequilibrium statistical mechanics. He received his Ph.D in 1998 from TIFR. He held postdoctoral positions at IISc, RRI and UC SantaCruz before joining the faculty of RRI in 2003. He has been a Professor at ICTS since 2012: He has won the 2009 Shanti Swarup Bhatnagar prize in physical sciences and the International Centre for Theoretical Physics science prize.