Eur. Phys. J. B (2014) 87: 10
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2013-40866-7

Regular Article

Particle transport in space-periodic potentials in underdamped systems

¹ NSC “Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology”, 1 Akademicheskaya str., 61108 Kharkov, Ukraine
² Kharkov National University, 4 Svobody Sq., 61077 Kharkov, Ukraine
³ NTU “Kharkov Polytechnic Institute”, 21 Frunze str., 61145 Kharkov, Ukraine

^a e-mail: march@kipt.kharkov.ua

Received: 24 September 2013
Received in final form: 20 November 2013
Published online: 13 January 2014

Abstract

We consider the motion of an underdamped Brownian particle in a tilted periodic potential in a wide temperature range. Based on the previous data and the new simulation results we show that the underdamped motion of particles in space-periodic potentials can be considered as overdamped motion in the velocity space in the effective double-well potential. Simple analytic expressions for the particle mobility and diffusion coefficient are derived with the use of the presented model. These accurately match numerical simulation results.