Towards a relativistic statistical theory

In special relativity the mathematical expressions, defining physical observables as the momentum, the energy etc, emerge as one parameter (light speed) continuous deformations of the corresponding ones of the classical physics. Here, we show that the special relativity imposes a proper one parameter continuous deformation also to the expression of the classical Boltzmann-Gibbs-Shannon entropy. The obtained relativistic entropy permits to construct a coherent and selfconsistent relativistic statistical theory [Phys. Rev. E {\bf 66}, 056125 (2002); Phys. Rev. E {\bf 72}, 036108 (2005)], preserving the main features (maximum entropy principle, thermodynamic stability, Lesche stability, continuity, symmetry, expansivity, decisivity, etc.) of the classical statistical theory, which is recovered in the classical limit. The predicted distribution function is a one-parameter continuous deformation of the classical Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution and has a simple analytic form, showing power law tails in accordance with the experimental evidence.Comment: Physica A (2006). Proof correction

Statistical Theory of Asteroid Escape Rates

Transition states in phase space are identified and shown to regulate the rate of escape of asteroids temporarily captured in circumplanetary orbits. The transition states, similar to those occurring in chemical reaction dynamics, are then used to develop a statistical semianalytical theory for the rate of escape of asteroids temporarily captured by Mars. Theory and numerical simulations are found to agree to better than 1%. These calculations suggest that further development of transition state theory in celestial mechanics, as an alternative to large-scale numerical simulations, will be a fruitful approach to mass transport calculations

Statistical theory of plasma turbulence

We present a statistical theory of intermittency in plasma turbulence based on short-lived coherent structures (instantons). In general, the probability density functions (PDFs) of the flux R are shown to have an exponential scaling P(R) ∝ exp (-cRs ) in the tails. In ion-temperature-gradient turbulence, the exponent takes the value s = 3/2 for momentum flux and s = 3 for zonal flow formation. The value of s follows from the order of the highest nonlinear interaction term and the moments for which the PDFs are computed. The constant c depends on the spatial profile of the coherent structure and other physical parameters in the model. Our theory provides a powerful mechanism for ubiquitous exponential scalings of PDFs, often observed in various tokamaks. Implications of the results, in particular, on structure formation are further discussed

Statistical theory of spectra: Statistical moments as descriptors in the theory of molecular similarity

Statistical moments of the intensity distributions are used as molecular descriptors. They are used as a basis for defining similarity distances between two model spectra. Parameters which carry the information derived from the comparison of shapes of the spectra and are related to the number of properties taken into account, are defined.Comment: Poster presented at the 3rd NEXT-Sigma-Phi Conference, Crete, Aug.2005, revtex, 13 pages including 6 figure