Diffusion of particles bouncing on a one-dimensional periodically corrugated floor - art. no. 036215

We report on a class of spatially extended mechanical systems sustaining a transport process of diffusive type. These systems consist of a point parti cle subject to a constant vertical acceleration and bouncing on a one-dimen sional periodically corrugated floor. We show that the deterministic dynami cs of these systems is chaotic with small elliptic islands for many paramet er values. The motion of particles perturbed by a small noise has a horizon tal diffusion that is normal. In such a case, we show that the diffusion co efficient oscillates periodically as the energy of particles increases. In the absence of noise, there still exists an effective numerical value for t he diffusion coefficient and this value has an irregular dependence on ener gy.