Related papers: Initial-State Dependence of Thermodynamic Dissipat…
We study the nonequilibrium thermodynamics of pure decoherence processes in open quantum systems coupled to a thermal reservoir. We review various definitions of central quantities, such as internal energy, work, heat and entropy…
It is argued that a typical many body energy eigenstate has a well defined thermodynamic entropy and that individual eigenstates possess thermodynamic characteristics analogous to those of generic isolated systems. We examine large systems…
Employing the trace distance as a measure for the distinguishability of quantum states, we study the influence of initial correlations on the dynamics of open systems. We concentrate on the Jaynes-Cummings model for which the knowledge of…
The evaluation of the specific heat of an open, damped quantum system is a subtle issue. One possible route is based on the thermodynamic partition function which is the ratio of the partition functions of system plus bath and of the bath…
The physical foundations of a variety of emerging technologies --- ranging from the applications of quantum entanglement in quantum information to the applications of nonequilibrium bulk and interface phenomena in microfluidics, biology,…
The thermodynamics of quantum systems coupled to periodically modulated heat baths and work reservoirs is developed. By identifying affinities and fluxes, the first and second law are formulated consistently. In the linear response regime,…
The nature of the behaviour of an isolated many-body quantum system periodically driven in time has been an open question since the beginning of quantum mechanics. After an initial transient, such a system is known to synchronize with the…
Nature, in the form of dissipation, inevitably intervenes in our efforts to control a quantum system. In this talk we show that although we cannot, in general, compensate for dissipation by coherent control of the system, such effects are…
The act of measuring a system has profound consequences of dynamical and thermodynamic nature. In particular, the degree of irreversibility ensuing from a non-equilibrium process is strongly affected by measurements aimed at acquiring…
Small thermodynamic systems exhibit peculiar behavior different from that observed in long-scale systems. Non-equilibrium processes taking place in those systems are strongly influenced by the presence of fluctuations which can be large.…
This work presents a general unifying theoretical framework for quantum non-equilibrium systems. It is based on a re-statement of the dynamical problem as one of inferring the distribution of collision events that move a system toward…
The entropy produced when a system undergoes an infinitesimal quench is directly linked to the work parameter susceptibility, making it sensitive to the existence of a quantum critical point. Its singular behavior at $T=0$, however,…
Dissipative adaptation is a general thermodynamic mechanism that explains self-organization in a broad class of driven classical many-body systems. It establishes how the most likely (adapted) states of a system subjected to a given drive…
A small system in contact with a macroscopic environment usually approaches an asymptotic state, determined only by some macroscopic properties of the environment such as the temperature or the chemical potential. In the long-time limit,…
Thermodynamic relations are derived from first principles of mechanics for non-equilibrium processes. Since the key role herein is played by the law of increase of entropy, the latter is analyzed at first. It is shown that its derivation…
A microscopic understanding of the thermodynamic entropy in quantum systems has been a mystery ever since the invention of quantum mechanics. In classical physics, this entropy is believed to be the logarithm of the volume of phase space…
A recently developed approach to the thermodynamics of open quantum systems, on the basis of the principle of minimal dissipation, is applied to the spin-boson model. Employing a numerically exact quantum dynamical treatment based on the…
The destruction of quantum interference, decoherence, and the destruction of entanglement both appear to occur under the same circumstances. To address the connection between these two phenomena, we consider the evolution of arbitrary…
We study the dynamics of the quantum phase distribution associated with the reduced density matrix of a system for a number of situations of practical importance, as the system evolves under the influence of its environment, interacting via…
The quantum thermodynamic behavior of small systems is investigated in presence of finite quantum dissipation. We consider the archetype cases of a damped harmonic oscillator and a free quantum Brownian particle. A main finding is that…