Related papers: Thermodynamic work from operational principles
The separation of internal energy into heat and work in quantum thermodynamics is a controversial issue for a long time, and we revisit and solve this problem in this work. It is shown that the Hamiltonian plays dual roles for a quantum…
Thermodynamics is a branch of science blessed by an unparalleled combination of generality of scope and formal simplicity. Based on few natural assumptions together with the four laws, it sets the boundaries between possible and impossible…
Quantum thermodynamics is a powerful theoretical tool for assessing the suitability of quantum materials as platforms for novel technologies. In particular, the modeling of quantum cycles allows us to investigate the heat changes and work…
Quantum thermodynamics allows for the interconversion of quantum coherence and mechanical work. Quantum coherence is thus a potential physical resource for quantum machines. However, formulating a general nonequilibrium thermodynamics of…
The relationship between thermodynamics and statistical physics is valid in the thermodynamic limit - when the number of particles becomes very large. Here, we study thermodynamics in the opposite regime - at both the nano scale, and when…
Heat and work are fundamental concepts for thermodynamical systems. When these are scaled down to the quantum level they require appropriate embeddings. Here we show that the dependence of the particle spectrum on system size giving rise to…
We present a critical examination of the difficulties with the quantum versions of a lifted weight that are widely used as work storage systems in quantum thermodynamics. To overcome those difficulties, we turn to the strong connections…
In his Comment [1], Philip Strasberg (PS) argues from the analysis of different examples that the framework we have presented in [2] does not recover known results of macroscopic textbook thermodynamics. Here, we show that such apparent…
We consider the Non-Equilibrium Steady State induced by two infinite quantum thermal reservoirs at different temperatures and derive an inequality giving the upper bound of the work extracted by cyclic operations. This upper bound tends to…
Thermodynamics is commonly presented as a theory of macroscopic systems in stable equilibrium, built upon assumptions of extensivity and scaling with system size. In this paper, we present a universal formulation of the elementary…
One of the most important goals in quantum thermodynamics is to demonstrate advantages of thermodynamic protocols over their classical counterparts. For that, it is necessary to (i) develop theoretical tools and experimental set-ups to deal…
Various approaches of defining and determining work performed on a quantum system are compared. Any operational definition of work, however, must allow for two facts, first, that work characterizes a process rather than an instantaneous…
Assigning the variations of internal energy into heat or work contributions is a challenging task due to the fact that these properties are trajectory dependent. A number of proposals have been put forward for open quantum systems following…
Of indisputable relevance for non-equilibrium thermodynamics, fluctuations theorems have been generalized to the framework of quantum thermodynamics, with the notion of work playing a key role in such contexts. The typical approach consists…
This thesis investigates the connection between quantum theory, thermodynamics and information theory. Theories with structure similar to that of quantum theory are considered, mathematically described by the framework of "Generalized…
The second law of thermodynamics, formulated as an ultimate bound on the maximum extractable work, has been rigorously derived in multiple scenarios. However, the unavoidable limitations that emerge due to the lack of control on small…
We define thermodynamic configurations and identify two primitives of discrete quantum processes between configurations for which heat and work can be defined in a natural way. This allows us to uncover a general second law for any discrete…
Quantum thermodynamics and quantum information are two frameworks for employing quantum mechanical systems for practical tasks, exploiting genuine quantum features to obtain advantages with respect to classical implementations. While…
There are both practical and foundational motivations to consider the thermodynamics of quantum systems at small scales. Here we address the issue of autonomous quantum thermal machines that are tailored to achieve some specific…
The proper definition of entropy is fundamental to the relationship between statistical mechanics and thermodynamics. It also plays a major role in the recent debate about the validity of the concept of negative temperature. In this paper,…