Related papers: Thermodynamics and small quantum systems
Environments in quantum thermodynamics usually take the role of heat baths. These baths are Markovian, weakly coupled to the system, and initialized in a thermal state. Whenever one of these properties is missing, standard quantum…
The coupling of two-level quantum systems to the thermal environment is a fundamental problem, with applications ranging from qubit state preparation to spin models. However, for the elementary problem of the thermodynamics of an ensemble…
In this work, we put forward the theoretical foundation toward thermodynamics of quantum impurity systems measurable in experiments. The theoretical developments involve the identifications on two types of thermodynamic entanglement…
This review is devoted to the problem of thermalization in a small isolated conglomerate of interacting constituents. A variety of physically important systems of intensive current interest belong to this category: complex atoms, molecules…
Quantum thermodynamics is a powerful theoretical tool for assessing the suitability of quantum materials as platforms for novel technologies. In particular, the modeling of quantum cycles allows us to investigate the heat changes and work…
This work focuses on the response to an external field of a Brownian particle submerged in an Ohmic quantum thermal bath. The field only affects the dynamics of the central particle without affecting the thermal reservoir. The thermodynamic…
One of the fundamental problems of quantum statistical physics is how an ideally isolated quantum system can ever reach thermal equilibrium behavior despite the unitary time evolution of quantum-mechanical systems. Here, we study, via…
A key quantity characterizing a time-periodically forced quantum system coupled to a heat bath is the energy flowing in the steady state through the system into the bath, where it is dissipated. We derive a general expression which allows…
We explore the effects of frequent, impulsive quantum nondemolition measurements of the energy of two-level systems (TLS), alias qubits, in contact with a thermal bath. The resulting entropy and temperature of both the system and the bath…
The well-known increase of the decoherence rate with the temperature, for a quantum system coupled to a linear thermal bath, holds no longer for a different bath dynamics. This is shown by means of a simple classical non-linear bath, as…
Entanglement within a given device provides a potential resource for quantum information processing. Entanglement between system and environment leads to decoherence (thus suppressing non-classical features within the system) but also opens…
Somewhat surprisingly, quantum features can be extracted from a classical bath. For this, we discuss a sample of three-level atoms in ladder configuration interacting only via the surrounding bath, and show that the fluorescence light…
The circumstances under which a system reaches thermal equilibrium, and how to derive this from basic dynamical laws, has been a major question from the very beginning of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. Despite considerable…
We consider a quantum system weakly coupled to a large heat bath of harmonic oscillators. It is well known that such a boson bath initially at thermal equilibrium thermalises the system. We show that assuming a priori an equilibrium state…
Quantum thermodynamics aims at extending standard thermodynamics and non-equilibrium statistical physics to systems with sizes well below the thermodynamic limit. A rapidly evolving research field, which promises to change our understanding…
An attempt toward the operational formulation of quantum thermodynamics is made by employing the recently proposed operations forming positive operator-valued measures for generating thermodynamic processes. The quantity of heat as well as…
The presence of symmetries in a closed many-body quantum system results in integrability. For such integrable systems, complete thermalization does not occur. As a result, the system remains non-ergodic. On the other hand, a set of…
Small systems (of interest in the areas of nanophysics, quantum information, etc.) are particularly vulnerable to environmental effects. Thus, we determine various thermodynamic functions for an oscillator in an arbitrary heat bath at…
A unified view on macroscopic thermodynamics and quantum transport is presented. Thermodynamic processes with an exchange of energy between two systems necessarily involve the flow of other balanceable quantities. These flows are first…
A particle subjected to a fluctuating force originated from its interaction with an external quantum system undergoes quantum Brownian motion. This phenomenon is investigated in detail for the case of a particle confined by a harmonic…