Studies of thermal conductivity in Fermi-Pasta-Ulam-like lattices

The pioneering computer simulations of the energy relaxation mechanisms performed by Fermi, Pasta, and Ulam (FPU) can be considered as the first attempt of understanding energy relaxation and thus heat conduction in lattices of nonlinear oscillators. In this paper we describe the most recent achievements about the divergence of heat conductivity with the system size in one-dimensional (1D) and two-dimensional FPU-like lattices. The anomalous behavior is particularly evident at low energies, where it is enhanced by the quasiharmonic character of the lattice dynamics. Remarkably, anomalies persist also in the strongly chaotic region where long-time tails develop in the current autocorrelation function. A modal analysis of the 1D case is also presented in order to gain further insight about the role played by boundary conditions. (C) 2005 American Institute of Physics.