Related papers: Efficient and tunable Aharonov-Bohm quantum heat e…
We examine the efficiency of an effective two-terminal thermoelectric device under broken time-reversal symmetry. The setup is derived from a three-terminal thermoelectric device comprising a thermal terminal and two electronic contacts,…
Optimizing the performance of thermal machines is an essential task of thermodynamics. We here consider the optimization of information engines that convert information about the state of a system into work. We concretely introduce a…
We explore the dependence of the performance bounds of heat engines and refrigerators on the initial quantum state and the subsequent evolution of their piston, modeled by a quantized harmonic oscillator. Our goal is to provide a fully…
A quantum engine fueled by quantum measurement is proposed. Under the finite-time adiabatic driving regime, the conversion of heat to work is realized without the compression and expansion of the resonance frequency. The work output,…
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…
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 heat modulator is proposed based on a voltage-biased Aharonov-Bohm interferometer. Once an electrical bias is applied, Peltier effects give rise to a flow of heat that can be modulated by a magnetic flux. We determine the corresponding…
We study the thermoelectric properties and heat-to-work conversion performance of an interacting, multi-level quantum dot (QD) weakly coupled to electronic reservoirs. We focus on the sequential tunneling regime. The dynamics of the charge…
We propose a two-stage cycle for an optimized linear-irreversible heat engine that operates, in a finite time, between a hot (cold) reservoir and a finite auxiliary system acting as a sink (source) in the first (second) stage. Under the…
Carnot efficiency sets a fundamental upper bound on the heat engine efficiency, attainable in the quasi-static limit, albeit at the cost of completely sacrificing power output. In this Letter, we present a minimal heat engine model that can…
A long standing open problem whether a heat engine with finite power achieves the Carnot efficiency is investigated. We rigorously prove a general trade-off inequality on thermodynamic efficiency and time interval of a cyclic process with…
We consider two modifications of a recently proposed three-terminal quantum dot heat engine. First, we investigate the necessity of the thermalization assumption, namely that electrons are always thermalized by inelastic processes when…
We propose a quantum heat engine composed of two superconducting transmission line resonators interacting with each other via an optomechanical-like coupling. One resonator is periodically excited by a thermal pump. The incoherently driven…
We introduce a simple two-level heat engine to study the efficiency in the condition of the maximum power output, depending on the energy levels from which the net work is extracted. In contrast to the quasi-statically operated Carnot…
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…
We propose a scheme for a single-atom quantum heat engine based on ultra-cold atom technologies. Building on the high degree of control typical of cold atom systems, we demonstrate that three paradigmatic heat engines -- Carnot, Otto and…
We investigate, in an analytical fashion, quantum Carnot cycles of a microscopic heat engine coupled to two nite heat reservoirs, whose internal cycles could own higher e ciency than the standard Carnot limit without consuming extra quantum…
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…
We evaluate the efficiency at maximum power of a quantum-dot Carnot heat engine. The universal value of the coefficients at the linear and quadratic order in the temperature gradient are reproduced. Curzon-Ahlborn efficiency is recovered in…
Unlike charge, heat flows are difficult to control. We show that, in mesoscopic conductors, electronic thermal currents can be manipulated with a magnetic field by using the Aharonov-Bohm effect: the magnetic control of the interference…