First-passage time distribution of a Brownian particle harmonically confined in a viscoelastic bath (opens in new tab)

We investigate theoretically and experimentally the first passage-time properties of a spherical Brownian particle that is harmonically trapped at thermal equilibrium in a fluid at constant temperature. By using the overdamped version of the generalized Langevin equation, we derive a general expression for the probability density function of the time that the particle takes to reach for the first time the minimum of the potential starting from a...