English

Work Required for Selective Quantum Measurement

Quantum Physics 2021-09-28 v6 Statistical Mechanics

Abstract

In quantum mechanics, we define the measuring system MM in a selective measurement by two conditions. Firstly, when we define the measured system SS as the system in which the non-selective measurement part acts, MM is independent from the measured system SS as a quantum system in the sense that any time-dependent process in the total system S+MS+M is divisible into parts for SS and MM. Secondly, when we can separate SS and MM from each other without changing the unitary equivalence class of the state of SS from that obtained by the partial trace of MM, the eigenstate selection in the selective measurement cannot be realized. In order for such a system MM to exist, we show that in one selective measurement of an observable of a quantum system S0S_0 of particles in SS, there exists a negative entropy transfer from MM to SS that can be directly transformed into an amount of Helmholtz free energy of kBTk_BT where TT is the thermodynamic temperature of the system SS. Equivalently, an extra amount of work, kBTk_BT, is required to be done by the system MM.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1610.00757,
  title  = {Work Required for Selective Quantum Measurement},
  author = {Eiji Konishi},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1610.00757},
  year   = {2021}
}

Comments

38 pages, 7 figures, published version

R2 v1 2026-06-22T16:09:24.715Z