Complex Adaptive Matter & Nonequilibrium Dynamics
Robert Ecke
Los Alamos National Laboratory
MST-10, MS K764
Los Alamos, NM 87545
(505) 667-6733
(505) 665-7652 FAX
One aspect of CAM is the approach to equilibrium or steady state in systems with many degrees of freedom and subject to constraints of different types. Depending on the process, the goal or end result can be ordered structures as in self-assembly or disordered matter such as for glasses or proteins. The important aspect of this approach is understanding general features of the dynamics of relaxation and disorder. Many of these ideas have been prominent in areas of nonlinear science for decades including pattern formation (self-assembly on a macro scale!), multiple scale analysis and nonlinear coupling of interactions, and attempted generalizations of equilibrium statistical mechanics. Great insight into these problems have come from fluid dynamics, a prototypical nonlinear, non-equilibrium system, from fracture and granular materials where novel and exciting phenomena have offered new approaches to solid mechanics and statistical physics, and from recent advances in biophysics such as laser manipulation of polymers and membranes. Putting together these ideas in a concrete and comprehensive manner to further the development and understanding of materials will be both challenging and exciting. My own concept is to explore the notions of an energy landscape as a system seeking equilibrium or steady state in the presence of constraints. I will discuss how this might be accomplished using model or analog systems that are easy to characterize and understand. The approach will include experimental, numerical and theoretical ingredients.