Instabilities and Nonequilibrium Structures IV [electronic resource] /

We have classified the articles presented here in two Sections according to their general content. In Part I we have included papers which deal with statistical mechanics, math­ ematical aspects of dynamical systems and sthochastic effects in nonequilibrium systems. Part II is devoted mainly to instabilities and self-organization in extended nonequilibrium systems. The study of partial differential equations by numerical and analytic methods plays a great role here and many works are related to this subject. Most recent developments in this fascinating and rapidly growing area are discussed. PART I STATISTICAL MECHANICS AND RELATED TOPICS NONEQUILIBRIUM POTENTIALS FOR PERIOD DOUBLING R. Graham and A. Hamm Fachbereich Physik, Universitiit Gesamthochschule Essen D4300 Essen 1 Germany ABSTRACT. In this lecture we consider the influence of weak stochastic perturbations on period doubling using nonequilibrium potentials, a concept which is explained in section 1 and formulated for the case of maps in section 2. In section 3 nonequilibrium potentials are considered for the family of quadratic maps (a) at the Feigenbaum 'attractor' with Gaussian noise, (b) for more general non­ Gaussian noise, and (c) for the case of a strange repeller. Our discussion will be informal. A more detailed account of this and related material can be found in our papers [1-3] and in the reviews [4, 5], where further references to related work are also given. 1.