  The near-field electromagnetic interaction between nanoscale objects produces
enhanced radiative heat transfer that can greatly surpass the limits
established by far-field black-body radiation. Here, we present a theoretical
framework to describe the temporal dynamics of the radiative heat transfer in
ensembles of nanostructures, which is based on the use of an eigenmode
expansion of the equations that govern this process. Using this formalism, we
identify the fundamental principles that determine the thermalization of
collections of nanostructures, revealing general but often unintuitive
dynamics. Our results provide an elegant and precise approach to efficiently
analyze the temporal dynamics of the near-field radiative heat transfer in
systems containing a large number of nanoparticles.
