Emergence of Nonlocal Hydrodynamics in Many-Body Radiative Heat Transport

arXiv:2610.16488 · cond-mat.mes-hall · Submitted 2026-10-12 · Read on arXiv

cond-mat.mes-hall

Submitted: 2026-10-12

Updated: 2026-10-12

License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

The gist: We develop a nonlocal hydrodynamic theory of radiative heat transport in many-body systems by coarse graining their microscopic electrodynamic interactions.

Abstract

We develop a nonlocal hydrodynamic theory of radiative heat transport in many-body systems by coarse graining their microscopic electrodynamic interactions. Long-range radiative exchange naturally generates a spatially nonlocal constitutive relation in which the heat current at a given position depends on temperature gradients over an extended region, while energy conservation retains its local conservative form. Fourier transport emerges as a controlled long-wavelength limit when the interaction kernel has a finite second spatial moment. When this moment fails to converge, spatial nonlocality survives coarse graining and gives rise to non-Fourier transport. The resulting framework establishes a systematic bridge between discrete many-body fluctuational electrodynamics and a continuous description of radiative heat transport.

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