Universal Form of Stochastic Evolution for Slow Variables in Equilibrium Systems

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Nonlinear, multiplicative Langevin equations for a complete set of slow variables in equilibrium systems are generally derived on the basis of the separation of time scales. The form of the equations is universal and equivalent to that obtained by Green. An equation with a nonlinear friction term for Brownian motion turns out to be an example of the general results. A key method in our derivation is to use different discretization schemes in a path integral formulation and the corresponding Langevin equation, which also leads to a consistent understanding of apparently different expressions for the path integral in previous studies.