Related papers: Heat, work, and fluctuations in a driven quantum r…
In recent years, the study of heat to work conversion has been re-invigorated by nanotechnology. Steady-state devices do this conversion without any macroscopic moving parts, through steady-state flows of microscopic particles such as…
We study a driven harmonic oscillator operating an Otto cycle between two thermal baths of finite size. By making extensive use of the tools of Gaussian quantum mechanics, we directly simulate the dynamics of the engine as a whole, without…
Considering an entropy-based division of energy transferred into heat and work, we develop an alternative theoretical framework for the thermodynamic analysis of two-level systems. When comparing these results with those obtained under the…
Thermodynamics is traditionally concerned with systems comprised of a large number of particles. Here we present a framework for extending thermodynamics to individual quantum systems, including explicitly a thermal bath and work-storage…
The efficiency of any heat engine, defined as the ratio of average work output to heat input, is bounded by Carnot's celebrated result. However, this measure is insufficient to characterize the properties of miniaturized heat engines…
In addition to their central role in quantum information processing, qubits have proven to be useful tools in a range of other applications such as enhanced quantum sensing and as spectrometers of quantum noise. Here we show that a…
The question of whether quantum coherence is a resource beneficial or detrimental to the performance of quantum heat engines has been thoroughly studied but remains undecided. To isolate the contribution of coherence, we analyze the…
In quantum dot junctions capacitively coupled to a resonator, electron tunneling through the quantum dot can be used to transfer heat between different parts of the system. This includes cooling or heating the electrons in electrodes and…
The work provides an overview on some recent advances in the area of quantum thermodynamics and quantum heat engines. A particular emphasis is put on the possibility of constructing finite time quantum cycles and adiabatic shortcuts. We…
Much experimental effort is invested these days in fabricating nanoelectromechanical systems (NEMS) that are sufficiently small, cold, and clean, so as to approach quantum mechanical behavior as their typical quantum energy scale…
The impact of quantum mechanics on thermodynamics, particularly on the principles and designs of heat machines (HM), has been limited by the incompatibility of quantum coherent evolution with the dissipative, open-system nature of all…
Thermodynamics was developed in the XIXth century to provide a physical description to engines and other macroscopic thermal machines. Since then, progress in nanotechnologies urged to extend these formalism, initially designed for…
From synthetic active devices such as self-propelling Janus colloids to micro-organisms like bacteria, micro-algae, living cells in tissues, active fluctuations are ubiquitous. Thermodynamics of small systems involving thermal as well as…
At the dawn of thermodynamics, Carnot's constraint on efficiency of heat engines stimulated the formulation of one of the most universal physical principles, the second law of thermodynamics. In recent years, the field of heat engines…
We demonstrate that in a standard thermo-electric nanodevice the current and heat flows are not only dictated by the temperature and potential gradient, but also by the external action of a local quantum observer that controls the coherence…
Describing the thermodynamic properties of quantum systems far from equilibrium is challenging, in particular when the system is strongly coupled to its environment, or when memory effects cannot be neglected. Here, we address such regimes…
Inspired by the idea that quantum computers can be useful in advancing basic science, we use a quantum processor to experimentally validate a number of theoretical results in non-equilibrium quantum thermodynamics, that were not (or were…
Allowing the order of quantum operations to exist in superposition is known to open new routes for thermodynamic tasks. We investigate a quantum heat engine where energy exchanges are driven by generalized measurements, and the sequence of…
Operational quantum stochastic thermodynamics is a recently proposed theory to study the thermodynamics of open systems based on the rigorous notion of a quantum stochastic process or quantum causal model. In there, a stochastic trajectory…
Owing to the ubiquity of synchronization in the classical world, it is interesting to study its behavior in quantum systems. Though quantum synchronisation has been investigated in many systems, a clear connection to quantum technology…