title: Classical van der Waals heat flow between oscillators and between half-spaces.
abstract: We find the steady-state heat flow P between two classical harmonic oscillators having natural frequency ω0, dynamically identical, damped, and acted on by Langevin forces appropriate, respectively, to temperatures T1 and T2 (with k(B)T1,2 ≫ ℏω0). Retardation and relativistic effects are disregarded. Considered individually, each of the two normal modes of the joint system behaves as if it were in equilibrium at the average temperature (T1 + T2)/2, but the modes are correlated, and it is these correlations that govern P. From P one readily calculates the classical heat flow per unit area between two Drude-modelled half-spaces. It emerges that, by contrast to equilibrium statistical mechanics, theories of such steady-state systems must generally specify the mechanism they envisage for enforcing the nominally prescribed temperatures.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Sussex, Brighton BN1 9QH, UK.
authors.forename: Gabriel
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Barton