Related papers: Non-equilibrium quantum heat machines
Non-equilibrium states of quantum systems in contact with thermal baths help telling environments with different temperatures or different statistics apart. We extend these studies to a more generic problem that consists in discriminating…
We study the maximum efficiency of a Carnot cycle heat engine based on a small system. It is revealed that due to the finiteness of the system, irreversibility may arise when the working substance contacts with a heat bath. As a result,…
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…
We demonstrate that the system composed of a gyrotropic particle out of thermal equilibrium with vacuum can be regarded as a heat engine. Such a particle, initially at rest, will experience a fluctuation-induced torque and start to rotate,…
Following the result by Skrzypczyk et al., arXiv:1009.0865, that certain self-contained quantum thermal machines can reach Carnot efficiency, we discuss the functioning of self-contained quantum thermal machines and show, in a very general…
We study the unitary time evolution of a simple quantum Hamiltonian describing a heat engine coupled to two heat baths. The engine is modeled as a three-level system. Each heat bath consists of a single harmonic oscillator. The engine is…
The context of the present paper is stochastic thermodynamics - an approach to nonequilibrium thermodynamics rooted within the broader framework of stochastic control. In contrast to the classical paradigm of Carnot engines, we herein…
We study universal aspects of fluctuations in an ensemble of noninteracting continuous quantum thermal machines in the steady state limit. Considering an individual machine, such as a refrigerator, in which relative fluctuations (and high…
At the very foundation of the second law of thermodynamics lies the fact that no heat engine operating between two reservoires of temperatures $T_C\leq T_H$ can overperform the ideal Carnot engine: $\langle W \rangle / \langle Q_H \rangle…
The Carnot theorem, one expression of the second law of thermodynamics, places a fundamental upper bound on the efficiency of heat engines operating between two heat baths. The Carnot theorem can be stated in a more generalized form for…
Active Brownian engines rectify energy from reservoirs composed of self-propelling non-equilibrium molecules into work. We consider a class of such engines based on an underdamped Brownian particle trapped in a power-law potential. The…
The quantum analog of Carnot cycles in few-particle systems consists of two quantum adiabatic steps and two isothermal steps. This construction is formally justified by use of a minimum work principle. It is then shown, without relying on…
Sadi Carnot's theorem regarding the maximum efficiency of heat engines is considered to be of fundamental importance in thermodynamics. This theorem famously states that the maximum efficiency depends only on the temperature of the heat…
Stability is an important property of small thermal machines with fluctuating power output. We here consider a finite-time quantum Carnot engine based on a degenerate multilevel system and study the influence of its finite Hilbert space…
The efficiency of any heat engine, defined as the ratio of average work output to heat input, is bounded by Carnot's celebrated result. However, this measure is insufficient to characterize the properties of miniaturized heat engines…
We study a quantum thermal engine model for which the heat transfer law is determined by Einstein's theory of radiation. The working substance of the quantum engine is assumed to be a two-level quantum systems of which the constituent…
In this article, we briefly review dynamical and thermodynamical aspects of different forms of quantum motors and quantum pumps. We then extend previous results to provide new theoretical tools for a systematic study of those phenomena at…
We consider optimizations of Lenoir heat engine within a quantum dynamical field consisting of $N$ noninteracting fermions trapped in multilevel infinite potential square-well. Fermions play role as working substance of the engine with each…
The Carnot statement of the second law of thermodynamics poses an upper limit on the efficiency of all heat engines. Recently, it has been studied whether generic quantum features such as coherence and quantum entanglement could allow for…
We suggest alternative quantum Otto engines, using heat bath algorithmic cooling with partner pairing algorithm instead of isochoric cooling. Liquid state nuclear magnetic resonance systems in one entropy sink are considered as working…