Related papers: Universal constraint for efficiency and power of a…
In a recent Letter [EPL, 118 (2017) 40003], Polettini and Esposito claimed that it is theoretically possible for a thermodynamic machine to achieve Carnot efficiency at divergent power output through the use of infinitely-fast processes. It…
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…
A pair of systems at different temperatures is a classic environment for a heat engine, which produces work during the relaxation to a common equilibrium. It is generally believed that a direct interaction between the two systems will…
The efficiency of an heat engine is traditionally defined as the ratio of its average output work over its average input heat. Its highest possible value was discovered by Carnot in 1824 and is a cornerstone concept in thermodynamics. It…
We consider a three-stroke engine in the microscopic regime, where the working body of the engine is composed of a two-level system. The working body of the engine aims to withdraw heat from the hot heat bath, generate work, and discharge…
We formulate the work output and efficiency for linear irreversible heat engines working between a finite-sized hot heat source and an infinite-sized cold heat reservoir until the total system reaches the final thermal equilibrium state…
Aiming to explore physical limits of wind turbines, we develop a model for determining the work extractable from a compressible fluid flow. The model employs conservation of mass, energy and entropy and leads to a universal bound for the…
In Markovian dynamics with the local detailed balance condition, we decompose the total entropy production rate into microscopic transitions. By applying this decomposition to the heat to work conversion process, we rigorously show that the…
Machines are only Carnot efficient if they are reversible, but then their power output is vanishingly small. Here we ask, what is the maximum efficiency of an irreversible device with finite power output? We use a nonlinear scattering…
Abstract The Curzon-Ahlborn (CA) efficiency, as the efficiency at the maximum power (EMP) of the endoreversible Carnot engine, has a significant impact on finite-time thermodynamics. However, the CA engine model is based on many…
In this paper we investigate the relationship between the efficiency of a cyclic quantum heat engine with the Hilbert space dimension of the thermal baths. By means of a general inequality, we show that the Carnot efficiency can be obtained…
We consider two specific thermodynamic cycles of engine operating in a finite time coupled to two thermal reservoirs with a finite heat capacity: The Carnot-type cycle and the Lorenz-type cycle. By means of the endo-reversible…
Mesoscopic thermoelectric heat engine is much anticipated as a device that allows us to utilize with high efficiency wasted heat inaccessible by conventional heat engines. However, the derivation of the heat current in this engine seems to…
The thermodynamic uncertainty relation provides an inequality relating any mean current, the associated dispersion and the entropy production rate for arbitrary non-equilibrium steady states. Applying it here to a general model of a…
We model a Brownian heat engine as a Brownian particle that hops in a periodic ratchet potential where the ratchet potential is coupled with a linearly decreasing background temperature. It is shown that the efficiency of such Brownian heat…
Producing a large current typically requires large dissipation, as is the case in electric conduction, where Joule heating is proportional to the square of the current. Stochastic thermodynamics offers a framework to study nonequilibrium…
We introduce a universal scheme to divide the power output of a periodically driven quantum heat engine into a classical contribution and one stemming solely from quantum coherence. Specializing to Lindblad-dynamics and small driving…
In systems described by the scattering theory, there is an upper bound, lower than Carnot, on the efficiency of steady-state heat to work conversion at a given output power. We show that interacting systems can overcome such bound and…
We develop a geometric framework to describe the thermodynamics of microscopic heat engines driven by slow periodic temperature variations and modulations of a mechanical control parameter. Covering both the classical and the quantum…
We introduce a simple model for an engine based on the Nernst effect. In the presence of a magnetic field, a vertical heat current can drive a horizontal particle current against a chemical potential. For a microscopic model invoking…