Confined Riesz gas: From Newtonian Dynamics to Emergent Hydrodynamics
Abstract
We investigate the real-time dynamics of the Riesz gas (RG), a paradigmatic system of particles with power-law interactions that encapsulates several many-body interacting classical systems. While the equilibrium properties of the system have been extensively studied the connection between microscopic dynamics, macroscopic evolution and thermalization has remained largely unexplored. Combining extensive large-scale Newtonian simulations with a hydrodynamic framework formulated in terms of three coarse grained fields -- density, velocity, and temperature -- we establish a direct and quantitative correspondence between the two descriptions. The hydrodynamic theory incorporates two phenomenological transport coefficients, the bulk viscosity $\xi$ and thermal conductivity $\kappa$, which encode dissipative effects at a macroscopic level. By analyzing representative classes of initial conditions, such as dome-like and Newton-cradle-type profiles, we find excellent agreement between microscopic and hydrodynamic evolution over a broad range of timescales, starting from relatively early all the way up to times at which steady state is attained. Notably, this agreement persists across a substantial window of $\xi$ and $\kappa$, demonstrating the robustness of the emergent hydrodynamic description. Our results provide a systematic validation of hydrodynamics in the RG and establish a concrete bridge between Newtonian dynamics and continuum theories in systems with power-law interactions, starting from first principles.