title: Intrinsic irreversibility of Markovian chains.
abstract: We show that for a large class of stationary Markov processes the total variation distance between the final equilibrium distribution and that at a given time is a strongly monotonic vanishing function. We illustrate this for basic paradigmatic processes and discuss how, for systems susceptible to a canonical description, this can be interpreted as a statistical arrow of time that exists besides the standard decrease of free energy.
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Roma "La Sapienza," I-00185 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Di Porto
authors.affiliation: Department of Applied Physics, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California 91125, USA.
authors.forename: B
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Crosignani
authors.affiliation: Dipartimento di Fisica, Università di Roma "La Sapienza," I-00185 Rome, Italy and IPCF-CNR, Università di Roma "La Sapienza," I-00185 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: DelRe