Related papers: Work measurement in an optomechanical quantum heat…
Under a general framework, shortcuts to adiabatic processes are shown to be possible in classical systems. We then study the distribution function of the work done on a small system initially prepared at thermal equilibrium. It is found…
Typical optomechanical systems involving optical cavities and mechanical oscillators rely on a coupling that varies linearly with the oscillator displacement. However, recently a coupling varying instead as the square of the mechanical…
The concept of inner friction, by which a quantum heat engine is unable to follow adiabatically its strokes and thus dissipates useful energy, is illustrated in an exact physical model where the working substance consists of an ensemble of…
In the standard framework of thermodynamics the work produced or consumed in a process is a random variable whose average value is bounded by the change in the free energy of the system. This work is calculated without regard for the size…
Non-equilibrium effects may have a profound impact on the performance of thermal devices performing thermodynamic tasks such as refrigeration or heat pumping. The possibility of enhancing the performance of thermodynamic operations by means…
The aim of this book chapter is to indicate how quantum phenomena are affecting the operation of microscopic thermal machines, such as engines and refrigerators. As converting heat to work is one of the fundamental concerns in…
Quantum many-body systems present substantial technical challenges from both analytical and numerical perspectives. Despite these difficulties, some progress has been made, including studies of interacting atomic gases and interacting…
In this article we use optimal control to maximize the efficiency of a quantum heat engine executing the Otto cycle in the presence of external noise. We optimize the engine performance for both amplitude and phase noise. In the case of…
Micro-optomechanical systems are central to a number of recent proposals for realizing quantum mechanical effects in relatively massive systems. Here we focus on a particular class of experiments which aim to demonstrate massive quantum…
Quantum measurements affect the state of the observed systems via back-action. While projective measurements extract maximal classical information, they drastically alter the system's configuration. In contrast, indirect measurements…
Standard treatments of quantum work using projective energy measurements erase initial coherence and alter the dynamics, thereby failing to capture the thermodynamic effects of coherent superpositions of energy eigenstates in an ensemble of…
To optimize the performance of a heat engine in finite-time cycle, it is important to understand the finite-time effect of thermodynamic processes. Previously, we have shown that extra work is needed to complete a quantum adiabatic process…
In our paper we estimated the quantum backaction of dispersive imaging with off-resonant light on Bose-Einstein condensates. We have calculated the rates of the two processes involved, phase diffusion and depletion of the condensate. We…
Continuous quantum measurement and feedback induce energy exchange between a dissipative qubit and a monitor even in the steady state, as a measurement backaction. Using the Lindblad equation, we identified the maximum and minimum values of…
Efficiency and power are two central measures of the performance of thermal machines. We here study the power-efficiency-stability trade-off in a finite-time quantum Carnot information engine, in which an information reservoir replaces the…
We devise a new technique to enhance transmission of quantum information through linear optical quantum information processors. The idea is based on applying the Quantum Zeno effect to the process of photon absorption. By frequently…
We compare quantum Otto engines based on two different cycle models: a two-bath model, with a standard heat source and sink, and a measurement-based protocol, where the role of heat source is played by a quantum measurement. We furthermore…
Recent evidence suggests that quantum effects may have functional importance in biological light-harvesting systems. Along with delocalized electronic excitations, it is now suspected that quantum coherent interactions with certain…
The development of microwave photon detectors is paving the way for a wide range of quantum technologies and fundamental discoveries involving single photons. Here, we investigate the photon emission from a microwave cavity and find that…
We present a proposal of a set-up to measure the work distribution due to an arbitrary unitary process acting on the spatial transverse degrees of freedom of a light beam. Hermite-Gaussian optical modes representing a quantum harmonic…