Related papers: Maximum power, ecological function and efficiency …
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…
We evaluate the efficiency at maximum power of a quantum-dot Carnot heat engine. The universal value of the coefficients at the linear and quadratic order in the temperature gradient are reproduced. Curzon-Ahlborn efficiency is recovered in…
The quantum analog of Carnot cycles in few-particle systems consists of two quantum adiabatic steps and two isothermal steps. This construction is formally justified by use of a minimum work principle. It is then shown, without relying on…
In a recent Letter [EPL, 118 (2017) 40003], Polettini and Esposito claimed that it is theoretically possible for a thermodynamic machine to achieve Carnot efficiency at divergent power output through the use of infinitely-fast processes. It…
An equilibrium reversible cycle with a certain engine to transduce the energy of any chemical reaction into mechanical energy is proposed. The efficiency for chemical energy transduction is also defined so as to be compared with Carnot…
We analyze the efficiency of thermal engines (either quantum or classical) working with a single heat reservoir like atmosphere. The engine first gets an energy intake, which can be done in arbitrary non-equilibrium way e.g. combustion of…
Differences between the thermodynamic behavior of the three-level amplifier (a quantum heat engine based on a thermally pumped laser) and the classical Carnot cycle are usually attributed to the essentially quantum or discrete nature of the…
Originally, the Carnot cycle is a theoretical thermodynamic cycle that provides an upper limit on the efficiency that any classical thermodynamic engine can achieve during the conversion of heat into work, or conversely, the efficiency of a…
A quantum-mechanical analog of the Carnot engine reversibly working at vanishing temperature, shortly termed the quantum-mechanical Carnot engine, is discussed. A general formula for the efficiency of such an engine with an arbitrary…
A heat engine operating in the one-shot finite-size regime, where systems composed of a small number of quantum particles interact with hot and cold baths and are restricted to one-shot measurements, delivers fluctuating work. Further,…
We discussed the criterion for usefully comparing an irreversible cycle with a reversible one, and show that the lost work cannot be determined by the usual cycle diagrams, contrary to what has been found in the literature. To better…
It is known that an engine with ideal efficiency ($\eta =1$ for a chemical engine and $e = e_{\rm Carnot}$ for a thermal one) has zero power because a reversible cycle takes an infinite time. However, at least from a theoretical point of…
It is well known that Carnot cycle is the thermodynamic cycle which has the best thermal efficiency. However, an entire class of cycles exists that can have the same maximum efficiency: this class is that of the regenerative Reitlinger…
Heat engines extract work by running cyclically between two heat reservoirs. When the two reservoirs are thermal and at different temperatures, the maximum efficiency of the engine is given by the Carnot limit. Here we consider a quantum…
Thermodynamics places a limit on the efficiency of heat engines, but not on their output power or on how the power and efficiency change with the engine's cycle time. In this manuscript, we develop a geometrical description of the power and…
We consider the performance of periodically driven stochastic heat engines in the linear response regime. Reaching the theoretical bounds for efficiency and efficiency at maximum power typically requires full control over the design and the…
The efficiency of cyclic heat engines is limited by the Carnot bound. This bound follows from the second law of thermodynamics and is attained by engines that operate between two thermal baths under the reversibility condition whereby the…
We consider the quality factor Q, which quantifies the trade-off between power, efficiency, and fluctuations in steady-state heat engines modeled by dynamical systems. We show that the nonlinear scattering theory, both in classical and…
The efficiency at maximum power has been investigated extensively, yet the practical control scheme to achieve it remains elusive. We fill such gap with a stepwise Carnot-like cycle, which consists the discrete isothermal process (DIP) and…
Thermodynamic constraints impose a trade-off between power and efficiency in heat engines, preventing the simultaneous achievement of high power and high efficiency. For classical microscopic engines, explicit inequalities have been…