Mean first passage times of Brownian rotators from differential recurrence relations

Abstract

An exact method of calculation of mean first passage times (analogous to that previously used [W. T. Coffey, Yu. P. Kalmykov, E. S. Massawe, and J. T. Waldron, J. Chem. Phys. 99, 4011 (1993)] for the correlation time) is developed in terms of continued fractions from the zero frequency limit of the Laplace transform of the set of differential recurrence relations generated by the Fokker–Planck or Langevin equations. The method because it is based on a Floquet representation avoids the use of quadratures and so may be easily generalized to multidegree of freedom systems by the use of matrix continued fractions. The procedure is illustrated by considering the mean first passage time of a fixed axis rotator with two equivalent sites.