Antonov problem and quasi-equilibrium states in an N-body system

Abstract

In this paper, a quantitative characterization for the evolutionary sequence of stellar self-gravitating system is investigated, focusing on the pre-collapse stage of the long-term dynamical evolution. In particular, we consider the quasi-equilibrium behaviors of the N-body systems in the setup of the so-called Antonov problem, i.e., self-gravitating N-body system confined in an adiabatic wall and try to seek a possible connection with thermostatistics of self-gravitating systems. For this purpose, a series of long-term N-body simulations with various initial conditions are performed. We found that a quasi-equilibrium sequence away from the thermal equilibrium can be characterized by the one-parameter family of the stellar models. Especially, the stellar polytropic distribution satisfying the effective equation of state P / � 1+1/n provides an excellent approximation to the evolutionary sequence of the N-body system. Based on the numerical results, we discuss a link between the quasi-equilibrium state and the generalized thermostatistics by means of the non-extensive entropy.