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Thermodynamics establishes that information acquired through measurement can be converted into work, as exemplified by Maxwell's demon and Szilard engines. Most experimental realizations of information engines, however, implicitly assume…

Soft Condensed Matter · Physics 2026-03-09 Lokesh Muruga , Felix Ginot , Sarah A. M. Loos , Clemens Bechinger

Maxwell's demon elucidates the value of information in thermodynamics, using measurement and feedback: he evolves an equilibrated gas into a nonequilibrium state, from which one might extract work. The demon can evolve the system farther…

We propose a setup based on two coupled quantum dots where thermodynamics of a measurement can be quantitatively characterized. The information obtained in the measurement can be utilized by performing feedback in a manner apparently…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2016-04-06 Aki Kutvonen , Takahiro Sagawa , Tapio Ala-Nissilä

Following the rising interest in quantum information science, the extension of a heat engine to the quantum regime by exploring microscopic quantum systems has seen a boom of interest in the last decade. Although quantum coherence in the…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2022-03-14 Wentao Ji , Zihua Chai , Mengqi Wang , Yuhang Guo , Xing Rong , Fazhan Shi , Changliang Ren , Ya Wang , Jiangfeng Du

Maxwell's demon (MD) has proven an instructive vehicle by which to explore the relationship between information theory and thermodynamics, fueling the possibility of information driven machines. A long standing debate has been the concern…

In the past decade several theoretical Maxwell's demon models have been proposed exhibiting effects such as refrigerating, doing work at the cost of information, and some experiments have been done to realise these effects. Here we propose…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2016-08-24 Peiyan Peng , Changkui Duan

Information-driven engines that rectify thermal fluctuations are a modern realization of the Maxwell-demon thought experiment. We introduce a simple design based on a heavy colloidal particle, held by an optical trap and immersed in water.…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2021-05-21 Tushar K. Saha , Joseph N. E. Lucero , Jannik Ehrich , David A. Sivak , John Bechhoefer

In many assembly line processes like metabolic and signaling networks in biological systems, the products of the first enzyme is the reactant for the next enzyme in the network. Working of multiple machines leads to efficient utilization of…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2025-06-17 Sandipan Dutta

Information engines can convert thermal fluctuations of a bath at temperature $T$ into work at rates of order $k_\mathrm{B}T$ per relaxation time of the system. We show experimentally that such engines, when in contact with a bath that is…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2023-12-25 Tushar K. Saha , Jannik Ehrich , Momčilo Gavrilov , Susanne Still , David A. Sivak , John Bechhoefer

A finite cycle time information engine based on a two-level system in contact with a thermal reservoir is studied analytically. The model for the engine incorporates an error in measuring the system's state and time delay between the…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2024-05-13 Kiran V , Toby Joseph

The emerging field of quantum thermodynamics is beginning to reveal the intriguing role that information can play in quantum thermal engines. Information enters as a resource when considering feedback-controlled thermal machines. While both…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2026-05-13 Lindsay Bassman Oftelie , Michele Campisi

We propose a new way of looking at the quantum Maxwell's demon problem in terms of conditional action. A "conditional action" on a system is a unitary time evolution, selected according to the result of a previous measurement, which can…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2020-10-28 Heinz-Jürgen Schmidt

The nanoscopic isothermal machines are not only energy but also information transducers. We show that the generalized fluctuation theorem with information creation and entropy reduction can be fulfilled for the enzymatic molecular machines…

Biological Physics · Physics 2017-02-06 Michal Kurzynski , Przemyslaw Chelminiak

Maxwell's demon is a special case of a feedback controlled system, where information gathered by measurement is utilized by driving a system along a thermodynamic process that depends on the measurement outcome. The demon illustrates that…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2015-06-16 Jordan M. Horowitz , Juan M. R. Parrondo

Converting information into work has during the last decade gained renewed interest as it gives insight into the relation between information theory and thermodynamics. Here we theoretically investigate an implementation of Maxwell's demon…

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics · Physics 2020-04-09 Björn Annby-Andersson , Peter Samuelsson , Ville F. Maisi , Patrick P. Potts

We present an experimental realization of an autonomous Maxwell's Demon, which extracts microscopic information from a System and reduces its entropy by applying feedback. It is based on two capacitively coupled single electron devices,…

Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics · Physics 2016-01-06 J. V. Koski , A. Kutvonen , I. M. Khaymovich , T. Ala-Nissila , J. P. Pekola

While most of the existing quantum information engines assisted by Maxwell's demon harness thermal fluctuations, those that rectify only quantum fluctuations have recently been constructed. We propose an alternative type of quantum…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2026-02-24 Kangqiao Liu , Masaya Nakagawa , Masahito Ueda

The Szilard engine is the simplest possible engine, composed only of one or more particles in a box. The box is then immersed in a heat bath and partitioned into two parts by a wall. It is known that in the cold temperature limit, one may…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2013-08-08 T. K. Chuan , D. Kaszlikowski

The limit of energy saving in the control of small systems has recently attracted much interest due to the concept refinement of the Maxwell demon. Inspired by a newly proposed set of fluctuation theorems, we report the first experimental…

Quantum Physics · Physics 2024-09-02 L. -L. Yan , J. -T. Bu , Q. Zeng , K. Zhang , K. -F. Cui , F. Zhou , S. -L. Su , L. Chen , J. Wang , Gang Chen , M. Feng

Interest in the thermodynamics of computation has revived in recent years, driven by developments in science, economics and technology. Given the consequences of the growing demand for computational power, the idea of reducing the energy…

Statistical Mechanics · Physics 2018-12-31 Thomas E Ouldridge , Rory A. Brittain , Pieter Rein ten Wolde