Abstract

We analyze in this work how the existence of macrostates with negative heat capacities can be accounted for in terms of the thermodynamic stability and the fluctuation-dissipation relation associated with an open system in thermodynamic equilibrium. As a by-product of this reasoning, we also provide new arguments concerning the existence of a complementary character between energy and temperature rather analogous to the one existing in quantum mechanics between position and momentum. © 2009 IOP Publishing Ltd.