Related papers: Macroscopic and Microscopic Thermal Equilibrium
We consider a quantum system A U B made up of degrees of freedom that can be partitioned into spatially disjoint regions A and B. When the full system is in a pure state in which regions A and B are entangled, the quantum mechanics of…
A model computational quantum thermodynamic network is constructed with two variable temperature baths coupled by a linker system, with an asymmetry in the coupling of the linker to the two baths. It is found in computational simulations…
Our recent study reveals that macroscopic structure in thermodynamically equilibrium state and its temperature dependence for classical discrete system can be well-characterized by a single specially-selected microscopic state (which we…
We show that a large class of nonequilibrium many-body systems in contact with two thermal baths admit an exact mapping onto equivalent equilibrium systems. This mapping provides direct access to nonequilibrium phase transition points from…
Why is thermalisation a universal phenomenon? How does a quantum system reach thermodynamical equilibrium? These questions are not new, dating even from the very birth of quantum theory and have been the subject of a renewed interest over…
We introduce a class of states, called minimally entangled typical thermal states (METTS), designed to resemble a typical state of a quantum system at finite temperature with a bias towards classical (minimally entangled) properties. These…
The eigenstate thermalization hypothesis (ETH) postulates that the energy eigenstates of an isolated many-body system are thermal, i.e., each of them already yields practically the same expectation values as the microcanonical ensemble at…
We consider a quantum system consisting of a regular chain of elementary subsystems with nearest neighbor interactions and assume that the total system is in a canonical state with temperature $T$. We analyze under what condition the state…
The principle of microscopic reversibility lies at the core of fluctuation theorems, which have extended our understanding of the second law of thermodynamics to the statistical level. In the quantum regime, however, this elementary…
We compare phase transition(-like) phenomena in small model systems for both microcanonical and canonical ensembles. The model systems correspond to a few classical (non-quantum) point particles confined in a one-dimensional box and…
A small quantum scattering system (the microsystem) is studied in interaction with a large system (the macrosystem) described by unknown stochastic variables. The interaction between the two systems is diagonal for the microsystem in a…
Thermal contact is the archetype of non-equilibrium processes driven by constant non-equilibrium constraints when the latter are enforced by reservoirs exchanging conserved microscopic quantities. At a mesoscopic scale only the energies of…
The validity of the Second Law of thermodynamics, indisputable in the macroscopic world, is challenged at the mesoscopic level: a mesoscopic isolated system, possessing spatial dimensions of the order of a few microns, is capable, as shown…
The dynamics of quantum entanglement plays a central role in explaining the emergence of thermal equilibrium in isolated many-body systems. However, entanglement is notoriously hard to measure. Recent works have introduced a notion of…
We consider a discrete quantum system coupled to a finite bath, which may consist of only one particle, in contrast to the standard baths which usually consist of continua of oscillators, spins, etc. We find that such finite baths may…
We investigate a system of two interacting qubits having one of them isolated and the other coupled to a thermal reservoir. We consider two different models of system-reservoir interaction: i) a "microscopic" model, in which the master…
Thermodynamics makes definite predictions about the thermal behavior of macroscopic systems in and out of equilibrium. Statistical mechanics aims to derive this behavior from the dynamics and statistics of the atoms and molecules making up…
Using holographic duality, we investigate thermalization process when two finite-size quantum critical systems are brought into thermal contact along a perfectly transmitting interface. Through real-time simulations of gravitational…
The recent experimental realization of exotic matter states in isolated quantum systems and the ensuing controversy about the existence of negative absolute temperatures demand a careful analysis of the conceptual foundations underlying…
The basic elements of the mathematical theory of states of thermal equilibrium of infinite systems of quantum anharmonic oscillators (quantum crystals) are outlined. The main concept of this theory is to describe the states of finite…