Brownian Motion in a Classical Ideal Gas: a Microscopic Approach to Langevin's Equation

Abstract

We present an insightful ``derivation&#39;&#39; of the Langevin equation and the fluctuation dissipation theorem in the specific context of a heavier particle moving through an ideal gas of much lighter particles. The Newton&#39;s Law of motion ($m{\ddot x}=F$) for the heavy particle reduces to a Langevin equation (valid on a coarser time scale) with the assumption that the lighter gas particles follow a Boltzmann velocity distribution. Starting from the kinematics of the random collisions we show that (1) the average force $<F> \propto -{\dot x}$ and (2) the correlation function of the fluctuating force $η= F-< F>$ is related to the strength of the average force.