Systemic coarse graining:: Four lessons and a caveat from nonequilibrium statistical mechanics

With the guidance offered by nonequilibrium statistical thermodynamics, simulation techniques are elevated from brute-force computer experiments to systematic tools for extracting complete, redundancy-free, and consistent coarse-grained information for dynamic systems. We sketch the role and potential of Monte Carlo, molecular dynamics, and Brownian dynamics simulations in the thermodynamic approach to coarse graining. A melt of entangled linear polyethylene molecules serves us as an illustrative example.