Thermal and quantal fluctuations in a model with repulsive potential.

Abstract

It is shown on a simple schematic model for the dipole resonance that, contrary to what happens for attractive potentials, for repulsive potentials the Gaussian approximation for the partition function is superior to the static path approximation. For repulsive separable potentials quantal fluctuations, rather than thermal fluctuations, dominate the thermal response of the system.