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Quantum Kinetic Theory

10. Transport coefficients

Chapman-Enskog method

After these preliminaries, we shall now construct a solution of the linearised kinetic equation (6.8) for the purpose of calculating the irreversible flows, which, as we recall, are nothing but the non-equilibrium parts of the charge flows and the energy-momentum tensor. We follow the Chapman-Enskog method and write

1

$$ \be \left( \ptt + \vecv_k \cdot \nabla\right) f^{\nul}_k = -L_k [\phi] {\rm{ }}{\rm{,}} \la{9.1} \ee $$

with the linearised collision operator given by (6.9), here and henceforth denoted as $L_k [\phi]$. At the left-hand side we have replaced $f_k$ by its zeroth-order approximation. However, one should note that for consistency with (6.10) we must have

2

$$ \be \sum \limits_{k} \int d\om_k\, \ps_k \left( \ptt + \vecv_k \cdot \nabla\right) f^{\nul}_k=0 {\rm{ }}{\rm{.}} \la{9.2} \ee $$

With the help of this equation the time derivative can be eliminated in favour of the gradients of the thermodynamic parameters. The details of this procedure, which may be pictured as a projection orthogonal to the collision invariants, are rather involved. Nevertheless, the final answer is easy to guess. Let us take a look at the gradient part in (10.1). Neglecting as usual quadratic terms, we get with (7.5), (7.6)

3

$$ \be \vecv_k \cdot \nabla f^{\nul}_k =- n_k (1 + \et n_k) \left[ \sum \limits_{\rA} q_{\rA k} \vecv_k \cdot \nabla \al_{\rA} + \ep_k \vecv_k \cdot \nabla \bt - \bt \vecp \vecv_k : \nabla \vecv \right] {\rm{ }}{\rm{.}} \la{9.3} \ee $$

If we now compare the various factors multiplying the gradients with the dissipative currents (9.5), (9.8), and (9.12), we observe that we can satisfy the orthogonality requirement by merely replacing these factors with the appropriate dissipative currents. This suggests that we should write

4

$$ \be n_k (1 + \et n_k)\left[ \sum \limits_{\rA} \vecj_{\rA k} \cdot \nabla \al_{\rA} + \vecj_{\rA k} \cdot \nabla \bt - \bt \overset{\circ}{\sf \pi}_k : \nabla \vecv \right] = L_k[\phi]{\rm{ }}{\rm{.}} \la{9.4} \ee $$
  • Exactly the same answer is obtained by the standard elimination procedure.

Inner product

Heat conductivity and viscosity

Curie's principle

Green-Kubo formulae