Related papers: Non-equilibrium dynamics in the quantum Brownian o…
We report two results complementing the second law of thermodynamics for Markovian open quantum systems coupled to multiple reservoirs with different temperatures and chemical potentials. First, we derive a nonequilibrium free energy…
The thermodynamic implications for the out-of-equilibrium dynamics of quantum systems are to date largely unexplored, especially for quantum many-body systems. In this paper we investigate the paradigmatic case of an array of…
We study entropy production in nanoscale devices, which are coupled to finite heat baths. This situation is of growing experimental relevance, but most theoretical approaches rely on a formulation of the second law valid only for infinite…
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…
Among various possible routes to extend entropy and thermodynamics to nonequilibrium steady states (NESS), we take the one which is guided by operational thermodynamics and the Clausius relation. In our previous study, we derived the…
We use the work done on and the heat removed from a system to maintain it in a nonequilibrium steady state for a thermodynamic-like description of such a system as well as of its fluctuations. Based on a generalized Onsager-Machlup theory…
Recently, in their attempt to construct steady state thermodynamics (SST), Komatsu, Nakagwa, Sasa, and Tasaki found an extension of the Clausius relation to nonequilibrium steady states in classical stochastic processes. Here we derive a…
It is proved here that, as a consequence of the unitary quantum evolution, the expectation value of a properly defined quantum entropy operator (as opposed to the non-evolving von Neumann entropy) can only increase during non adiabatic…
Non-equilibrium thermodynamics can provide strong advantages when compared to more standard equilibrium situations. Here, we present a general framework to study its application to concrete problems, which is valid also beyond the…
Thermodynamics is the phenomenological theory of heat and work. Here we analyze to what extent quantum thermodynamic relations are immune to the underlying mathematical formulation of quantum mechanics. As a main result, we show that the…
We study the influence of entanglement on the relation between the statistical entropy of an open quantum system and the heat exchanged with a low temperature environment. A model of quantum Brownian motion of the Caldeira-Leggett type -…
Classical thermodynamics is built with the concept of equilibrium states. However, it is less clear how equilibrium thermodynamics emerges through the dynamics that follows the principle of quantum mechanics. In this paper, we develop a…
All physical theories should obey the second law of thermodynamics. However, existing proposals to describe the dynamics of hybrid classical-quantum systems either violate the second law or lack a proof of its existence. Here we rectify…
Isoenergetic thermalization amongst $n$ bodies is a well-known irreversible process, bringing the bodies to a common temperature $T_F$ and leading to a rise in the total entropy of the bodies. We express this change in entropy using the…
We introduce an alternative way to understand the decomposition of a quantum system into interacting parts and show that it is natural in several physical models. This enables us to define a reduced density operator for a working system…
We propose an non-standard method to calculate non-equilibrium physical observables. Considering the generic example of an anharmonic quantum oscillator, we take advantage of the fact that the commutator algebra of second order polynomials…
The influence of the environment in the thermal equilibrium properties of a bipartite continuous variable quantum system is studied. The problem is treated within a system-plus-reservoir approach. The considered model reproduces the…
We assess two different non-equilibrium quantum Landauer bounds: the traditional approach based on the change in entropy, referred to as the `entropic bound', and one based on the details of the dynamical map, referred to as the…
In this work we present a formalism to describe non equilibrium conditions in systems with a discretized energy spectrum, such as quantum systems. We develop a formalism based on a combination of Gibbs-Shannon entropy and information…
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…