Weak disorder strongly improves the selective enhancement of diffusion in a tilted periodic potential

The diffusion of an overdamped Brownian particle in a tilted periodic potential is known to exhibit a pronounced enhancement over the free thermal diffusion within a small interval of tilt values. Here we show that weak disorder in the form of small, time-independent deviations from a strictly spati...

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Veröffentlicht in:Physical review letters 2008-10, Vol.101 (18), p.180601-180601, Article 180601
Hauptverfasser: Reimann, Peter, Eichhorn, Ralf
Format: Artikel
Sprache:eng
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Zusammenfassung:The diffusion of an overdamped Brownian particle in a tilted periodic potential is known to exhibit a pronounced enhancement over the free thermal diffusion within a small interval of tilt values. Here we show that weak disorder in the form of small, time-independent deviations from a strictly spatially periodic potential may further boost this diffusion peak by orders of magnitude. Our general theoretical predictions are in excellent agreement with experimental observations.
ISSN:0031-9007
1079-7114
DOI:10.1103/physrevlett.101.180601