E G D Cohen and David Mauzerall J. Stat. Mech. (2004) P07006 doi:10.1088/1742-5468/2004/07/P07006
E G D Cohen and David Mauzerall
Show affiliationsThe Jarzynski equality relates the free energy difference between two equilibrium states of a system to the average of the work over all irreversible phase space trajectories for going from one state to the other. We claim that the derivation of this equality is flawed, introducing an ad hoc and unjustified weighting factor which handles improperly the heat exchange with a heat bath. Therefore the experiment of Liphardt et al cannot be viewed as a confirmation of this equality, although the numerical deviations between the two are small. However, the Jarzynski equality may well be a useful approximation, e.g. in measurements on single molecules in solution.
mechanical properties (DNA, RNA, membranes, bio-polymers) (experiment)
Issue 07 (July 2004)
Received 23 June 2004, accepted for publication 29 June 2004
Published 13 July 2004
E G D Cohen and David Mauzerall J. Stat. Mech. (2004) P07006
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