Corresponding States for Thermal Conductivities Via Nonequilibrium Molecular Dynamics

We follow Rosenfeld in comparing fluid-phase thermal conductivities for several simple pair potentials. Within about ten percent these (nonelectronic) conductivities satisfy a corresponding states relation involving the equilibrium entropy. This corresponding states relation, deduced directly from the results of computer simulations, is also suggested by hard-sphere perturbation theory and by the quasiharmonic cell-model approach. The conductivity-entropy relation should be useful for estimating transport coefficients from the equation of state of monatomic fluids with arbitrary pair potentials.