title: Nonequilibrium mesoscopic transport: a genealogy.
abstract: Models of nonequilibrium quantum transport underpin all modern electronic devices, from the largest scales to the smallest. Past simplifications such as coarse graining and bulk self-averaging served well to understand electronic materials. Such particular notions become inapplicable at mesoscopic dimensions, edging towards the truly quantum regime. Nevertheless a unifying thread continues to run through transport physics, animating the design of small-scale electronic technology: microscopic conservation and nonequilibrium dissipation. These fundamentals are inherent in quantum transport and gain even greater and more explicit experimental meaning in the passage to atomic-sized devices. We review their genesis, their theoretical context, and their governing role in the electronic response of meso- and nanoscopic systems.
authors.affiliation: Department of Theoretical Physics, Research School of Physics and Engineering, The Australian National University, Canberra, ACT 0200, Australia. mukunda.das@anu.edu.au
authors.forename: Mukunda P
authors.initials: MP
authors.lastname: Das
authors.forename: Frederick
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Green