This issue of the Journal of Plasma Physics is dedicated
to
Radu Balescu on the occasion of his 65th birthday.Of the more than 170 articles published worldwide by Professor Balescu
to
date, more than 25 have been published in this journal. Readers of the
Journal
of Plasma Physics will thus be well acquainted with his contributions
to the
study of the interplay between plasma turbulence and the theory of transport
phenomena in magnetically confined plasmas. A vast community of students,
teachers and researchers will also have read or consulted the many monographs,
five to date, written by Balescu and world-famous for their clarity. In
his first
monograph, Statistical Mechanics of Charged Particles (Interscience,
New York),
published in 1963, the whole of plasma physics, including the transport
equation to which his name will remain attached, was put into the broader
context of statistical physics. The monograph Equilibrium and Non-Equilibrium
Statistical Mechanics (Wiley-Interscience, New York) followed in 1975,
and still
inspires many teachers today.
Brownian Ratchets: From Statistical Physics to Bio and Nano-Motors Brownian Ratchets: From Statistical Physics to Bio and Nano-Motors. CuberoDavid RenzoniFerruccio 198 pp. Cambridge U.P., New York, 2016. Price: $140 (hardcover). ISBN 978-1-107-06352-5.
