Related papers: Thermodynamic cost of external control
This article is a short version of a longer article to appear in Physics Reports (cond-mat/9708200). The essential postulates of classical thermodynamics are formulated, from which the second law is deduced as the principle of increase of…
Many physical, biological, and even social systems are faced with the problem of how to efficiently harvest free energy from an environment that can have many possible states, yet only have a limited number of harvesting protocols to choose…
The second law of nonequilibrium thermodynamics within the open system paradigm (a small system coupled to one or multiple baths) is derived. This is done by showing positivity of entropy production for arbitrary Hamiltonian dynamics for a…
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…
High speed machining has been improved thanks to considerable advancement on the tools (optimum geometry, harder materials), on machined materials (increased workability and machining capacity for harder workpieces) and finally on the…
The essential postulates of classical thermodynamics are formulated, from which the second law is deduced as the principle of increase of entropy in irreversible adiabatic processes that take one equilibrium state to another. The entropy…
We consider the problem of online learning of optimal control for repeatedly operated systems in the presence of parametric uncertainty. During each round of operation, environment selects system parameters according to a fixed but unknown…
Entropy production for a system not in the thermodynamic limit is formulated using Hill's nanothermodynamics, in which a macroscopic ensemble of such systems is considered. External influence of the environment on the average nanosystem is…
An optimal control problem with a time-parameter is considered. The functional to be optimized includes the maximum over time-horizon reached by a function of the state variable, and so an $L^\infty$-term. In addition to the classical…
We present a new outlook on the climate system thermodynamics, studying some of its macroscopic properties in terms of the 1st and 2nd laws of thermodynamics. We review and clarify the notion of efficiency of the climate system by…
Bio-molecules are active agents in that they consume energy to perform tasks. The standard theoretical description, however, considers only a system-external work agent. Fluctuation theorems, for example, do not allow work-exchange between…
In both classical and quantum thermodynamics, physical quantities are typically assigned objective values defined independently of our observations. We then refer to the 'work performed by a gas', or the 'entropy of the gas', regardless of…
It exists a large class of systems for which the traditional notion of extensivity breaks down. From experimental examples we induce two general hypothesis concerning such systems. In the first the existence of an internal coordinate system…
Because of its nonequilibrium character, active matter in a steady state can drive engines that autonomously deliver work against a constant mechanical force or torque. As a generic model for such an engine, we consider systems that contain…
Understanding the fundamental constraint on work far beyond the adiabatic regime is crucial to investigating fast and efficient energy extraction or consumption processes. In this study, we derive thermodynamic speed limits for…
Quantum dynamics controlled by a time-dependent coupling constant are studied. It is proven that an energy eigenstate expectation value of work done by the system in a quench process cannot exceed the work in the corresponding quasi-static…
There are many functional contexts where it is desirable to maintain a mesoscopic system in a nonequilibrium state. However, such control requires an inherent energy dissipation. In this article, we unify and extend a number of works on the…
We discuss the thermodynamics of closed quantum systems driven out of equilibrium by a change in a control parameter and undergoing a unitary process. We compare the work actually done on the system with the one that would be performed…
We carefully examine the thermodynamic consequences of the repeated partial projection model for coupling a quantum system to an arbitrary series of environments under feedback control. This paper provides observational definitions of heat…
We propose a concept of autonomous energy transducer at a molecular scale, where output is produced with small input energy, of the same order of the thermal energy, without restriction of magnitude or timing of input, and without any…