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In Szilard's engine, a demon measures a one-particle gas and applies feedback to extract work from thermal fluctuations, embodying Maxwell's notion that information reduces thermodynamic entropy - an apparent second-law violation. The…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2025-08-26 Xiangjun Xing

The ability to measure the stochastic degrees of freedom of a thermal system enables the extraction of energy from an equilibrium heat bath. This is the underlying principle of Maxwell's demon and subsequent information engines. Here, we…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2025-12-02 Rémi Goerlich , Gilad Pollack , Eli Flaxer , Saar Rahav , Yael Roichman

We present an experimental realization of an autonomous Maxwell's Demon, which extracts microscopic information from a System and reduces its entropy by applying feedback. It is based on two capacitively coupled single electron devices,…

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics · Physics 2016-01-06 J. V. Koski , A. Kutvonen , I. M. Khaymovich , T. Ala-Nissila , J. P. Pekola

Nearly all theoretical analyses of the Maxwell's demon focus on its energetic and entropic costs of operation. Here, we focus on its rate of operation. In our model, a demon's rate limitation stems from its finite response time and gate…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2019-08-27 Nathaniel Rupprecht , Dervis Vural

The paradox of Maxwell's demon motivated the development of information thermodynamics and the creation of nanoscale information engines. We now understand that machines such as the molecular motors within cells can in principle harvest…

Information engines, sometimes referred to as Maxwell Demon engines, utilize information obtained through measurement to control the conversion of energy into useful work. Discussions around such devices often assume the measurement step to…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2025-05-02 Henning Kirchberg , Abraham Nitzan

Maxwell's demon elucidates the value of information in thermodynamics, using measurement and feedback: he evolves an equilibrated gas into a nonequilibrium state, from which one might extract work. The demon can evolve the system farther…

Maxwell's Demon is at the heart of the interrelation between quantum information processing and thermodynamics. In this thought experiment, a demon generates a temperature gradient between two thermal baths initially at equilibrium by…

An autonomous out of equilibrium Maxwell's demon is used to reverse the natural direction of the heat flux between two electric circuits kept at different temperatures and coupled by the electric thermal noise. The demon does not process…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2020-12-30 Sergio Ciliberto

We propose a new thermodynamic equality and several inequalities concerning the relationship between work and information for an isothermal process with Maxwell's demon. Our approach is based on the formulation a la Jarzynski of the…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2007-05-23 Takahiro Sagawa , Masahito Ueda

Information engines model ``Maxwell's demon" mechanistically. However, the demon's strategy is pre-described by an external experimenter, and information engines are conveniently designed such that observables contain complete information…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2024-07-15 Dorian Daimer , Susanne Still

The emerging field of quantum thermodynamics is beginning to reveal the intriguing role that information can play in quantum thermal engines. Information enters as a resource when considering feedback-controlled thermal machines. While both…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2026-05-13 Lindsay Bassman Oftelie , Michele Campisi

A CMOS-based implementation of an autonomous Maxwell's demon was recently proposed (Phys. Rev. Lett. 129, 120602) to demonstrate that a Maxwell demon can still work at macroscopic scales, provided that its power supply is scaled…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2023-02-08 Nahuel Freitas , Massimiliano Esposito

In 1929, Leo Szilard invented a feedback protocol in which a hypothetical intelligence called Maxwell's demon pumps heat from an isothermal environment and transduces it to work. After an intense controversy that lasted over eighty years;…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2012-02-21 Shoichi Toyabe , Takahiro Sagawa , Masahito Ueda , Eiro Muneyuki , Masaki Sano

Motivated by the recent work by Mandal and Jarzynski on autonomous Maxwell demon information engine, we have extended their model by introducing two different heat baths. The system (demon) is coupled to a memory register (tape) and a work…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2016-11-23 Shubhashis Rana , A. M. Jayannavar

To induce transport, detailed balance must be broken. A common mechanism is to bias the dynamics with a thermodynamic fuel, such as chemical energy. An intriguing, alternative strategy is for a Maxwell demon to effect the bias using…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2015-06-11 Jordan M. Horowitz , Takahiro Sagawa , Juan M. R. Parrondo

We theoretically study the entropy production and the work extracted from a system connected to two reservoirs by periodic modulations of the electrochemical potentials of the reservoirs and the parameter of a system Hamiltonian under…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2023-07-18 Ryosuke Yoshii , Hisao Hayakawa

We introduce a family of Maxwellian Demons for which correlations among information bearing degrees of freedom can be calculated exactly and in compact analytical form. This allows one to precisely determine Demon functional thermodynamic…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2016-03-23 A. B. Boyd , D. Mandal , J. P. Crutchfield

We present a complete-quantum description of multi-particle Szilard engine which consists of a working substance and a Maxwell's demon. The demon is modeled as a multi-level quantum system with specific quantum control and the working…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2012-03-20 C. Y. Cai , H. Dong , C. P. Sun

We theoretically derive and experimentally compare several different ways to access entropy production in a quantum process under feedback control. We focus on a bipartite quantum system realizing an autonomous Maxwell's demon scheme…