title: Entropy and density of states from isoenergetic nonequilibrium processes.
abstract: Two identities in statistical mechanics involving entropy differences (or ratios of densities of states) at constant energy are derived. The first provides a nontrivial extension of the Jarzynski equality to the microcanonical ensemble [C. Jarzynski, Phys. Rev. Lett. 78, 2690 (1997)], which can be seen as a "fast-switching" version of the adiabatic switching method for computing entropies [M. Watanabe and W. P. Reinhardt, Phys. Rev. Lett. 65, 3301 (1990)]. The second is a thermodynamic integration formula analogous to a well-known expression for free energies, and follows after taking the quasistatic limit of the first. Both identities can be conveniently used in conjunction with a scaling relation (herein derived) that allows one to extrapolate measurements taken at a single energy to a wide range of energy values. Practical aspects of these identities in the context of numerical simulations are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Theoretical Division, T-13, MS B213, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545, USA. artur@brown.edu
authors.forename: Artur B
authors.initials: AB
authors.lastname: Adib