Related papers: General theory for thermal and nonthermal quantum …
We consider a photo--Carnot engine that consists of a single--mode radiation field in an optical cavity. One the heat reservoirs is made of a beam of thermally entangled pairs of two--level atoms that interact resonantly with the cavity. We…
After a brief historical perspective, we introduce the key notions of work and heat for quantum systems, to then apply them to quantum engines operating on quantum Otto and Carnot cycles. The irreversible and dissipative character of the…
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,…
We study the mechanical performance of quantum rotor heat engines in terms of common notions of work using two prototypical models: a mill driven by the heat flow from a hot to a cold mode, and a piston driven by the alternate heating and…
Optimal engine performances are accomplished by quantum effects. Here we explore two routes towards ideal engines, namely (1) quantum systems that operate as hybrid machines being able to perform more than one useful task and (2) the…
Whether the strong coupling to thermal baths can improve the performance of quantum thermal machines remains an open issue under active debate. Here, we revisit quantum thermal machines operating with the quasi-static Carnot cycle and aim…
Generalized measurements may allow the control of its back-action on the quantum system by interpolating from a very weak to strong projective action. Such a measurement can fuel a quantum heat engine or extract work depending on the…
A central building block of a heat engine is the working fluid, which mediates the conversion of heat into work. In nanoscale heat engines, the working fluid can be a quantum system whose behavior and dynamics are non-classical. A…
Based on a quantum thermodynamic protocol for shortcut to isothermality that smoothly modify the system-reservoir interaction can significantly speed up an isothermal process while keeping the overall dissipation constant [Phys. Rev. X. 10,…
We study the effect of Kerr nonlinearity in quantum thermal machines having a Kerr-nonlinear oscillator as working substance and operating under the ideal quantum Otto cycle. We first investigate the efficiency of a Kerr-nonlinear heat…
We proposed the finite-time cycle model of a measurement-based quantum cooler, where invasive measurement provides the power to drive the cooling cycle. Such a cooler may be regarded as an alternative thought experiment of Mawell's demon.…
We investigate the thermodynamics and fluctuations of a finite-time quantum Otto engine alternatively driven by a hot squeezed and a cold thermal reservoir. We show that reservoir squeezing significantly enhances the performance by…
We design a heat engine with multi-heat-reservoir, ancillary system and quantum memory. We then derive an inequality related with the second law of thermodynamics, and give a new limitation about the work gain from the engine by analyzing…
We present a mechanism for efficiency increase in quantum heat engines containing internal energy levels that do not couple to the external work sink. The gain is achieved by using these levels to channel heat in a direction opposite to the…
We analyze the performance of slowly driven meso- and micro-scale refrigerators and heat engines that operate between two thermal baths with small temperature difference. Using a general scaling argument, we show that such devices can work…
A process has been proposed to increase the efficiency of an ideal Otto cycle via a quantum heat engine that has no cooler reservoir. We show that such a process is not feasible.
We investigate the performance of a microscopic quantum heat engine consisting of V- or Lambda-type emitters interacting collectively or independently when being in contact with environmental thermal reservoirs. Though the efficiency of a…
In quantum thermodynamics, effects of finiteness of the baths have been less considered. In particular, there is no general theory which focuses on finiteness of the baths of multiple conserved quantities. Then, we investigate how the…
We consider a generic four-stroke quantum Otto engine consisting of two unitary and two thermalization strokes with an arbitrary many-body working medium. Using the Schwinger-Keldysh non-equilibrium Green's function formalism, we provide an…
We study coupled quantum systems as the working media of thermodynamic machines. Under a suitable phase-space transformation, the coupled systems can be expressed as a composition of independent subsystems. We find that for the coupled…