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We consider a question motivated by the third law of thermodynamics: can there be a local temperature arbitrarily close to absolute zero in a nonequilibrium quantum system? We consider nanoscale quantum conductors with the source reservoir…
The second law of thermodynamics places a limitation into which states a system can evolve into. For systems in contact with a heat bath, it can be combined with the law of energy conservation, and it says that a system can only evolve into…
We treat a quantum mechanical system with certain general properties which are expected to be common in macroscopic quantum systems. Starting from a PURE initial state (which may not describe an equilibrium) in which energy is mildly…
Fluctuation theorems and the second law of thermodynamics are powerful relations constraining the behavior of out-of-equilibrium systems. While there exist generalizations of these relations to feedback controlled quantum systems, their…
In a previous work (M. Campisi. Stud. Hist. Phil. M. P. 36 (2005) 275-290) we have addressed the mechanical foundations of equilibrium thermodynamics on the basis of the Generalized Helmholtz Theorem. It was found that the volume entropy…
This article describes the third law of thermodynamics. This law is often poorly known and is often decried, or even considered optional and irrelevant to describe weather and climate phenomena. This, however, is inaccurate and contrary to…
The essence of the second law of classical thermodynamics is the `entropy principle' which asserts the existence of an additive and extensive entropy function, S, that is defined for all equilibrium states of thermodynamic systems and whose…
The second law of thermodynamics states that entropy production in macroscopic systems is non-negative, reaching zero only at thermodynamic equilibrium. As a corollary, this implies that the state trajectory of macroscopic systems is…
In quantum statistical mechanics, equilibrium states have been shown to be the typical states for a system that is entangled with its environment, suggesting a possible identification between thermodynamic and von Neumann entropies. In this…
The second law of thermodynamics states that for a thermally isolated system entropy never decreases. Most physical processes we observe in nature involve variations of macroscopic quantities over spatial and temporal scales much larger…
Do negative absolute temperatures matter physics and specifically Statistical Physics? We provide evidence that we can certainly answer positively to this vexata quaestio. The great majority of models investigated by statistical mechanics…
Recently Allahverdyan and Nieuwenhuizen (cond-mat/0006404) argued that the second law of thermodynamics may be violated in a quantum system as a "consequence of quantum coherence in the presence of the slightly off-equilibrium nature of the…
Thermodynamics, the branch of physics concerned with the description of macroscopic bodies, heat exchange and the conversion of different forms of energy is based on four laws: the zeroth law, which states that bodies in thermal contact…
From black hole thermodynamics, the Bekenstein bound has been proposed as a universal thermal entropy bound. It has been further generalized to an entanglement entropy bound which is valid even in a quantum system. In a quantumly entangled…
The third law of thermodynamics dictates that the entropy of materials becomes zero as temperature ($T$) approaches zero. Contrarily, glass and other similar materials exhibit nonzero entropy at $T=0$, which contradicts the third law. For…
We discuss the generalized second law of thermodynamics in three different systems by taking quantum corrections (logarithmic and power law) to cosmological horizon entropy as well as black hole entropy. Firstly, we consider phantom energy…
The second law of thermodynamics states that the entropy of an isolated system can only increase over time. This appears to conflict with the reversible evolution of isolated quantum systems under the Schr\"odinger equation, which preserves…
Thermodynamics have been applied to astronomy, biology, psychology, some social systems and so on. But, various evolutions from astronomy to biology and social systems cannot be only increase of entropy. When fluctuations are magnified due…
This work presents a general unifying theoretical framework for quantum non-equilibrium systems. It is based on a re-statement of the dynamical problem as one of inferring the distribution of collision events that move a system toward…
The entropy production in dissipative processes is the essence of the arrow of time and the second law of thermodynamics. For dissipation of quantum systems, it was recently shown that the entropy production contains indeed two…