Variational derivation of the homogeneous Boltzmann equation

Abstract

We introduce a variational formulation of the homogeneous Boltzmann equation, with hard-sphere cross section, which selects the unique energy conserving solution. We prove that this solution arises from the microscopic dynamics, namely Kac's walk, and we establish the propagation in time of entropic chaoticity, under the minimal assumption that the initial distribution is entropically chaotic.