Related papers: Self-consistency of optimizing finite-time Carnot …
The efficiency of microscopic heat engines in a thermally heterogenous environment is considered. We show that, as a consequence of the recently discovered entropic anomaly, quasi-static engines, whose efficiency is maximal in a fluid at…
Delimiting the bounds of optimal performance for heat engines (HEs), refrigerators (REs), and heat pumps (HPs) is a central goal in thermodynamics. While low-dissipation (LD) models have proven valuable for this purpose, the role of heat…
A specific class of stochastic heat engines driven cyclically by time-dependent potential, which is defined in the half-line ($0<x<+\infty$), is analysed. For such engines, most of their physical quantities can be obtained explicitly,…
The Carnot theorem, one expression of the second law of thermodynamics, places a fundamental upper bound on the efficiency of heat engines operating between two heat baths. The Carnot theorem can be stated in a more generalized form for…
Thermodynamic process at zero-entropy-production (EP) rate has been regarded as a reversible process. A process achieving the Carnot efficiency is also considered as a reversible process. Therefore, the condition, `Carnot efficiency at…
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…
The Carnot engine sets an upper limit to the efficiency of a practical heat engine. An arbitrary irreversible engine is sometimes believed to behave closely as the Curzon-Ahlborn engine. Efficiency of the latter is obtained commonly by…
We analyze the efficiency of thermal engines (either quantum or classical) working with a single heat reservoir like atmosphere. The engine first gets an energy intake, which can be done in arbitrary non-equilibrium way e.g. combustion of…
We discuss the possibility of reaching the Carnot efficiency by heat engines (HEs) out of quasi-static conditions at nonzero power output. We focus on several models widely used to describe the performance of actual HEs. These models…
It is known that an engine with ideal efficiency ($\eta =1$ for a chemical engine and $e = e_{\rm Carnot}$ for a thermal one) has zero power because a reversible cycle takes an infinite time. However, at least from a theoretical point of…
We investigate the performance of an underdamped stochastic heat engine for a time-dependent harmonic oscillator. We analytically determine the optimal protocol that maximizes the efficiency at fixed power. The maximum efficiency reduces to…
Recent advances in experimental control of colloidal systems have spurred a revolution in the production of mesoscale thermodynamic devices. Functional "textbook" engines, such as the Stirling and Carnot cycles, have been produced in…
Here, we investigate the maximum power and corresponding efficiency of thermoelectric generators through devising a set of protocols for the isothermal and adiabatic processes of thermoelectricity to build a Carnot-like thermoelectric…
The maximum efficiency of autonomous engines with finite chemical potential difference is investigated. We show that without a particular type of singularity autonomous engines cannot attain the Carnot efficiency. In addition, we…
In this work we include, for the Carnot cycle, irreversibilities of linear finite rate of heat transferences between the heat engine and its reservoirs, heat leak between the reservoirs and internal dissipations of the working fluid. A…
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 study a class of cyclic Brownian heat engines in the framework of finite-time thermodynamics. For infinitely long cycle times, the engine works at the Carnot efficiency limit producing, however, zero power. For the efficiency at maximum…
Fluctuations of thermodynamic quantities become non-negligible and play an important role when the system size is small. We develop finite-time thermodynamics of fluctuations in microscopic heat engines whose environmental temperature and…
We investigate the thermoelectric performance of minimally nonlinear irreversible heat engines with broken time-reversal symmetry (TRS), realized through voltage and voltage-temperature probe configurations. Our framework extends the…
We construct an example of heat engine whose efficiency at maximum power breaks down the previously derived bounds in the linear response regime. Such example takes a classical harmonic oscillator as the working substance undergoing a…