Related papers: Non-equilibrium thermodynamics of small-scale syst…
We present a novel mechanism for thermalizing a system of particles in equilibrium and nonequilibrium situations, based on specifically modeling energy transfer at the boundaries via a microscopic collision process. We apply our method to…
Thermal contact is the archetype of non-equilibrium processes driven by constant non-equilibrium constraints when the latter are enforced by reservoirs exchanging conserved microscopic quantities. At a mesoscopic scale only the energies of…
Classical thermodynamics is built with the concept of equilibrium states. However, it is less clear how equilibrium thermodynamics emerges through the dynamics that follows the principle of quantum mechanics. In this paper, we develop a…
Small quantum systems non-weakly coupled to a bath become in the quantum regime surrounded by a cloud of photons or phonons, which modifies their thermodynamic behavior. Exactly solvable examples are the Brownian motion of a quantum…
We briefly review some equilibrium and nonequilibrium properties of systems with long-range interactions. Such systems, which are characterized by a potential that weakly decays at large distances, have striking properties at equilibrium,…
A resistor-network picture of transitions is appropriate for the study of energy absorption by weakly chaotic or weakly interacting driven systems. Such "sparse" systems reach a novel non-equilibrium steady state (NESS) once coupled to a…
Closely related to the laws of thermodynamics, the detection and quantification of disequilibria are crucial in unraveling the complexities of nature, particularly those beneath observable layers. Theoretical developments in nonequilibrium…
In systems with detailed balance, the stationary distribution and the equilibrium distribution are identical, creating a clear connection between energetic and entropic quantities. Many driven systems violate detailed balance and still pose…
For a two-level quantum mechanical system, we derive microscopically the exact expression for the fluctuation of microscopic work in a multi-step non-equilibrium process, and we rigorously prove that in an isothermal process, the…
We study the internal dynamics of an elementary quantum system placed close to a body held at a temperature different from that of the surrounding radiation. We derive general expressions for lifetime and density matrix valid for bodies of…
The 2nd law of thermodynamics yields an irreversible increase in entropy until thermal equilibrium is achieved. This irreversible increase is often assumed to require large and complex systems to emerge from the reversible microscopic laws…
The problem of the insensitivity of the macroscopic behavior of any thermodynamical system to partitioning generates a bias between the reproducibility of its macroscopic behavior viewed as the simplest form of causality and its long-term…
In this study, we advance the understanding of non-equilibrium systems by deriving thermodynamic relations for a heat engine operating under an exponentially decreasing temperature profile. Such thermal configurations closely mimic…
Despite its intrinsic non-equilibrium origin, thermoelectricity in nanoscale systems is usually described within a static scattering approach which disregards the dynamical interaction with the thermal baths that maintain energy flow. Using…
We examine the question of whether the formal expressions of equilibrium statistical mechanics can be applied to time independent non-dissipative systems that are not in true thermodynamic equilibrium and are nonergodic. By assuming the…
It is shown that the structure of non-equilibrium thermodynamic system far from equilibrium can be captured in terms of a generalized "Nambu dynamics", in the presence of fluctuation effects in non-equilibrium thermodynamics. Triangular…
Quantifying energy flows at nanometer scales promises to guide future research in a variety of disciplines, from microscopic control and manipulation, to autonomously operating molecular machines. A general understanding of the…
The second law of thermodynamics states that entropy production in macroscopic systems is non-negative, reaching zero only at thermodynamic equilibrium. As a corollary, this implies that the state trajectory of macroscopic systems is…
We obtain macroscopic adiabatic thermodynamic transformations by space-time scalings of a microscopic Hamiltonian dynamics subject to random collisions with the environment. The microscopic dynamics is given by a chain of oscillators…
Equation of state for systems with particles self-assembling into aggregates is derived within a mesoscopic theory combining density functional and field-theoretic approaches. We focus on the effect of mesoscopic fluctuations in the…