Cooperative transport with selective kinetic constraints

Area of Science:

• Statistical Mechanics
• Soft Matter Physics
• Non-equilibrium Systems

Background:

• The simple symmetric exclusion process is a fundamental model in statistical mechanics.
• Understanding particle transport in confined systems is crucial for various physical phenomena.

Purpose of the Study:

• To introduce and analyze a new class of cooperative exclusion processes.
• To investigate the impact of selective kinetic constraints on particle density profiles.
• To explore the relationship between these processes and anomalous diffusion in liquids.

Main Methods:

• Microscopic dynamics simulation of cooperative exclusion processes.
• Analysis of density profiles under varying boundary reservoir conditions.
• Mean-field analysis using a diffusion equation with density-dependent diffusion coefficient.

Main Results:

• The studied processes exhibit density profiles that can be concave, convex, or a combination thereof.
• These profiles differ significantly from those of the simple symmetric exclusion process.
• The behavior is dependent on the density of particle reservoirs at the system boundaries.

Conclusions:

• Cooperative exclusion processes with selective kinetic constraints offer a richer variety of density profiles.
• The observed phenomena can be qualitatively reproduced by a mean-field diffusion model.
• These findings suggest potential relevance to liquids exhibiting diffusivity anomalies.