NONEQUILIBRIUM THERMODYNAMICS THE LINEAR REGIME

In nonequilibrium steady states, the mean currents crossing the system depend on the nonequilibrium constraints given by the affinities or thermodynamic forces which vanish at equihbrium. Accordingly, the mean currents can be expanded in powers of the affinities around the equilibrium state. Many nonequilibrium processes are in the linear regime studied since Onsager classical work [7]. However, chemical reactions are known to involve the nonlinear regime. This is also the case for nanosystems such as the molecular motors as recently shown [66]. In the nonlinear regime, the mean currents depend on powers of the affinities so that it is necessary to consider the full Taylor expansion of the currents on the affinities ... 

The current frontiers for the subject of non-equilibrium thermodynamics are rich and active. Two areas dominate interest non-linear effects and molecular bioenergetics. The linearization step used in the near equilibrium regime is inappropriate far from equilibrium. Progress with a microscopic kinetic theory [38] for non-linear fluctuation phenomena has been made. Careful experiments [39] confirm this theory. Nonequilibrium long range correlations play an important role in some of the light scattering effects in fluids in far from equilibrium states [38, 39]. 

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