Related papers: Comment on: "Sadi Carnot on Carnot's theorem"
We introduce a simple two-level heat engine to study the efficiency in the condition of the maximum power output, depending on the energy levels from which the net work is extracted. In contrast to the quasi-statically operated Carnot…
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 constraint relation for efficiency and power is crucial to design optimal heat engines operating within finite time. We find a universal constraint between efficiency and output power for heat engines operating in the low-dissipation…
The figure of merit for refrigerators performing finite-time Carnot-like cycles between two reservoirs at temperature $T_h$ and $T_c$ ($<T_h$) is optimized. It is found that the coefficient of performance at maximum figure of merit is…
Quantum heat cycles and quantum refrigerators are analyzed using various quantum systems as their working mediums. For example, to evaluate the efficiency and the work done of the Carnot cycle in the quantum regime, one can consider the…
This work obtains the efficiency at maximum power for a stochastic heat engine performing Carnot-like, Stirling-like and Ericsson-like cycles. For the mesoscopic engine a Brownian particle trapped by an optical tweezers is considered. The…
Continuous particle exchange thermal machines require no time-dependent driving, can be realised in solid-state electronic devices, and miniaturised to nanometre scale. Quantum dots, providing a narrow energy filter and allowing to…
We study a refrigerator model which consists of two $n$-level systems interacting via a pulsed external field. Each system couples to its own thermal bath at temperatures $T_h$ and $T_c$, respectively ($\theta\equiv T_c/T_h<1$). The…
According to classical Boltzmannian thermodynamics, the efficiency of a cyclic machine is strictly lower than one. Such a result is a straightforward consequence of the second principle of thermodynamics. Recent advances in the study of the…
We define a kind of heat engine via three-dimensional charged BTZ black holes. This case is quite subtle and needs to be more careful. The heat flow along the isochores does not equal to zero since the specific heat $C_V\neq0$ and this…
We formulate the power-efficiency constraint of Carnot-like heat engines as a geometric optimization problem in the plane of normalized branch dissipations. Efficiency contours are straight lines in this plane, so maximizing efficiency at…
The efficiency of macroscopic heat engines is restricted by the second law of thermodynamics. They can reach at most the efficiency of a Carnot engine. In contrast, heat currents in mesoscopic heat engines show fluctuations. Thus, there is…
In a stochastic heat engine driven by a cyclic non-equilibrium protocol, fluctuations in work and heat give rise to a fluctuating efficiency. Using computer simulations and tools from large deviation theory, we have examined these…
Combining two disparate lines of thought like thermodynamics and quantum mechanics yields surprising results. The resulting idea of quantum thermodynamic engines holds promise for harvesting novel sources of energy of purely quantum origin,…
A single driven spin is investigated as the working substance of a six-stroke irreversible quantum Carnot cycle. The role of inner friction associated with the finite-time adiabatic transformations on the cycle efficiency and the harvested…
We study the efficiency at maximum power of two coupled heat engines, using thermoelectric generators (TEGs) as engines. Assuming that the heat and electric charge fluxes in the TEGs are strongly coupled, we simulate numerically the…
Two testable schemes for quantum heat engines are investigated under the quantization framework of noncommutative (NC) quantum mechanics (QM). By identifying the phenomenological connection between the phase-space NC driving parameters and…
We analytically derive maximum efficiency at given cooling power for Carnot-type low-dissipation refrigerators. The corresponding optimal cycle duration depends on a single parameter, which is a specific combination of irreversibility…
Developments in the thermodynamics of small quantum systems envisage non-classical thermal machines. In this scenario, energy fluctuations play a relevant role in the description of irreversibility. We experimentally implement a quantum…
We propose a theoretical model for a colloidal heat engine driven by a feedback protocol that is able to fully convert the net heat absorbed by the hot bath into extracted work. The feedback protocol, inspired by gambling strategies,…