Related papers: Quantum point contacts as heat engines
The unavoidable irreversible losses of power in a heat engine are found to be of quantum origin. Following thermodynamic tradition a model quantum heat engine operating by the Otto cycle is analyzed. The working medium of the model is…
There exist two formulations for quantum heat engine that models an energy transfer between two microscopic systems. One is semi-classical scenario, and the other is full quantum scenario. The former is formulated as a unitary evolution for…
Relativistic thermal devices offer a unique platform for understanding the interplay between motion, quantum fields, and thermodynamics, revealing phenomena inaccessible to stationary systems. We consider a two-qubit SWAP heat engine whose…
For heat engines working between two heat baths, functionality is often conditioned on a set of fixed constraints such as given internal structure of the engine and given temperatures for the baths. It is, however, important to devise heat…
We propose a quantum heat engine based on an Aharonov-Bohm interferometer in a two-terminal geometry, and investigate its thermoelectric performances in the linear response regime. Sizeable thermopower (up to $\sim 0.3\,\text{mV}$/K) as…
The optimal efficiency of quantum (or classical) heat engines whose heat baths are $n$-particle systems is given by the information geometry and the strong large deviation. We give the optimal work extraction process as a concrete…
In a quantum Stirling heat engine, the heat exchanged with two thermal baths is partly utilized for performing work by redistributing the energy levels of the working substance. We analyze the thermodynamics of a quantum Stirling engine…
One of the principal objectives of quantum thermodynamics is to explore quantum effects and their potential beneficial role in thermodynamic tasks like work extraction or refrigeration. So far, even though several papers have already shown…
Cyclical heat engines are a paradigm of classical thermodynamics, but are impractical for miniaturization because they rely on moving parts. A more recent concept is particle-exchange (PE) heat engines, which uses energy filtering to…
A quantum heat engine of a specific type is studied. This engine contains a single particle confined in the infinite square well potential with variable width and consists of three processes: the isoenergetic process (which has no classical…
At the dawn of thermodynamics, Carnot's constraint on efficiency of heat engines stimulated the formulation of one of the most universal physical principles, the second law of thermodynamics. In recent years, the field of heat engines…
The Carnot cycle is a prototype of ideal heat engine to draw mechanical energy from the heat flux between two thermal baths with the maximum efficiency, dubbed as the Carnot efficiency $\eta_{\mathrm{C}}$. Such efficiency can only be…
We consider the performance of periodically driven stochastic heat engines in the linear response regime. Reaching the theoretical bounds for efficiency and efficiency at maximum power typically requires full control over the design and the…
A new thermodynamic inequality is derived which leads to the maximum work that can be extracted from multi-heat baths with the assistance of discrete quantum feedback control. The maximum work is determined by the free-energy difference and…
The Carnot cycle imposes a fundamental upper limit to the efficiency of a macroscopic motor operating between two thermal baths. However, this bound needs to be reinterpreted at microscopic scales, where molecular bio-motors and some…
We design a heat engine with multi-heat-reservoir, ancillary system and quantum memory. We then derive an inequality related with the second law of thermodynamics, and give a new limitation about the work gain from the engine by analyzing…
The efficient conversion of thermal energy to mechanical work by a heat engine is an ongoing technological challenge. Since the pioneering work of Carnot, it is known that the efficiency of heat engines is bounded by a fundamental upper…
A suitable way of quantifying work for microscopic quantum systems has been constantly debated in the field of quantum thermodynamics. One natural approach is to measure the average increase in energy of an ancillary system, called the…
We consider the quality factor Q, which quantifies the trade-off between power, efficiency, and fluctuations in steady-state heat engines modeled by dynamical systems. We show that the nonlinear scattering theory, both in classical and…
The widely debated feasibility of thermodynamic machines achieving Carnot efficiency at finite power has been convincingly dismissed. Yet, the common wisdom that efficiency can only be optimal in the limit of infinitely-slow processes…