Past exam of the kinetic theory course of the University of Oxford / 2023 / 1 / d / Solution

Use $dz=d^{3}x{d}^{3}v$ and setFor unit particle mass, $\rho$ is both the number density and the mass density in the number convention of c. A fixed reference scale inside the logarithm changes $\mathcal{H}$ by a constant multiple of the conserved total mass, leaving its derivative unchanged.

Both prefactors in the source's part (d) need correction. Multiplication of the mean-field alignment equation by $|\mathbf{v}{|}^2/2$ and integration by parts givesExchange $z$ and $z_{\star }$, use the symmetry of $K$, and average the two expressions:The printed right-hand side omits $1/2$. This corrected velocity-alignment energy dissipation agrees with the pair-counting calculation in a.

For velocity-alignment entropy production, let $A(\mathbf{x},t)=\int K(\mathbf{x},{\mathbf{x}}_{\star })\rho ({\mathbf{x}}_{\star },t)d^3{x}_{\star }$. The velocity-space divergence is ${\nabla }_{\mathbf{v}}\cdot \mathbf{L}[f]=-3A$. Assuming $f>0$ and sufficient decay, integration by parts yieldsThe printed formula omits the factor $3$ from the three velocity components. In $d$ spatial dimensions, that factor would be $d$. Zeros of $f$ can be treated by a regularized entropy calculation when the required integrability holds.

A concrete smooth counterexample to both printed coefficients is $K\equiv 1$ and $f(z,0)=g(\mathbf{x})(2\pi {)}^{-3/2}{e}^{-|\mathbf{v}{|}^2/2}$, where $g$ is a positive normalized Gaussian distribution. The total mass is one, the total momentum is zero, and $\mathbf{L}[f]=-\mathbf{v}$ initially. The kinetic energy derivative is $-\int |\mathbf{v}{|}^{2}fdz=-3$, whereas the printed formula gives $-6$. The entropy functional derivative is $3$, whereas the printed formula gives $1$.

The signs describe cooling of relative velocities and contraction in phase space: $\mathcal{H}$ increases, so the fine-grained Gibbs entropy $-\mathcal{H}$ decreases. These dissipative particle dynamics are not an isolated Hamiltonian system; there is no contradiction with Liouville's theorem or the Boltzmann equation's usual entropy increase. The microscopic mechanism removing kinetic energy is outside this alignment model.