Unified approach to stochastic thermodynamics: Application to a quantum heat engine (original) (raw)
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Steady state fluctuations of the dissipated heat for a quantum stochastic model
Reviews in Mathematical Physics, 2006
We introduce a quantum stochastic dynamics for heat conduction. A multilevel subsystem is coupled to reservoirs at different temperatures. Energy quanta are detected in the reservoirs allowing the study of steady state fluctuations of the entropy dissipation. Our main result states a symmetry in its large deviation rate function.
Journal of the Physical Society of Japan, 2006
Half century has past since the pioneering works of Anderson and Kubo on the stochastic theory of spectral line shape were published in J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. 9 (1954) 316 and 935, respectively. In this review, we give an overview and extension of the stochastic Liouville equation focusing on its theoretical background and applications to help further the development of their works. With the aid of path integral formalism, we derive the stochastic Liouville equation for density matrices of a system. We then cast the equation into the hierarchy of equations which can be solved analytically or computationally in a nonperturbative manner including the effect of a colored noise. We elucidate the applications of the stochastic theory from the unified theoretical basis to analyze the dynamics of a system as probed by experiments. We illustrate this as a review of several experimental examples including NMR, dielectric relaxation, Mössbauer spectroscopy, neutron scattering, and linear and nonlinear laser spectroscopies. Following the summary of the advantage and limitation of the stochastic theory, we then derive a quantum Fokker-Planck equation and a quantum master equation from a system-bath Hamiltonian with a suitable spectral distribution producing a nearly Markovian random perturbation. By introducing auxiliary parameters that play a role as stochastic variables in an expression for reduced density matrix, we obtain the stochastic Liouville equation including temperature correction terms. The auxiliary parameters may also be interpreted as a random noise that allows us to derive a quantum Langevin equation for non-Markovian noise at any temperature. The results afford a basis for clarifying the relationship between the stochastic and dynamical approaches. Analytical as well as numerical calculations are given as examples and discussed.
Stochastic thermodynamics of a finite quantum system coupled to a heat bath
2021
We consider a situation where an N-level system (NLS) is coupled to a heat bath without being necessarily thermalized. For this situation, we derive general Jarzynski-type equations and conclude that heat and entropy is flowing from the hot bath to the cold NLS and, vice versa, from the hot NLS to the cold bath. The Clausius relation between increase of entropy and transfer of heat divided by a suitable temperature assumes the form of two inequalities which have already been considered in the literature. Our approach is illustrated by an analytical example.
Stochastic Thermodynamics in a Non-Markovian Dynamical System
2022
The developing field of stochastic thermodynamics extends concepts of macroscopic thermodynamics such as entropy production and work to the microscopic level of individual trajectories taken by a system through phase space. The scheme involves coupling the system to an environment typically a source of Markovian noise that affects the dynamics of the system. Here we extend this framework to consider a non-Markovian environment, one whose dynamics have memory and which create additional correlations with the system variables, and illustrate this with a selection of simple examples. Such an environment produces a rich variety of behaviours. In particular, for a case of thermal relaxation, the distributions of entropy produced under the non-Markovian dynamics differ from the equivalent case of Markovian dynamics only by a delay time. When a time-dependent external work protocol is turned on, the system’s correlations with the environment can either assist or hinder its approach to equi...
Quantum dynamical framework for Brownian heat engines
Physical Review E, 2013
We present a self contained formalism modelled after the Brownian motion of a quantum harmonic oscillator for describing the performance of microscopic Brownian heat engines like Carnot, Stirling and Otto engines. Our theory, besides reproducing the standard thermodynamics results in the steady state enables permits us to study the role dissipation plays in determining the efficiency of Brownian heat engines under actual laboratory conditions. In particular, we analyse in detail the dynamics associated with decoupling a system in equilibrium with one bath and recoupling it to another bath and obtain exact analytical results which are shown to have significant ramifications on the efficiencies of engines involving such a step. We also develop a simple yet powerful technique for computing corrections to the steady state results arising from finite operation time and use it to arrive at the thermodynamic complementarity relations for various operating conditions and also to compute the efficiencies of the three engines cited above at maximum power. Some of the methods and techniques and exactly solvable models presented here are interesting in their own right and, in our opinion, would find useful applications in other contexts as well.
Probabilistically Violating the First Law of Thermodynamics in a Quantum Heat Engine
arXiv: Quantum Physics, 2021
Fluctuations of thermodynamic observables, such as heat and work, contain relevant information on the underlying physical process. These fluctuations are however not taken into account in the traditional laws of thermodynamics. While the second law is extended to fluctuating systems by the celebrated fluctuation theorems, the first law is generally believed to hold even in the presence of fluctuations. Here we show that in the presence of quantum fluctuations, also the first law of thermodynamics may break down. This happens because quantum mechanics imposes constraints on the knowledge of heat and work. To illustrate our results, we provide a detailed case-study of work and heat fluctuations in a quantum heat engine based on a circuit QED architecture. We find probabilistic violations of the first law and show that they are closely connected to quantum signatures related to negative quasi-probabilities. Our results imply that in the presence of quantum fluctuations, the first law o...
The Model of Quantum Thermodynamics From the First Principles: Quantum Halo or Small Environment
arXiv: Quantum Physics, 2020
The evolution of the joint system (JS) - ``quantum system (QS)+thermal bath (TB)" is considered in the framework of a complex probabilistic processes that satisfies the stochastic differential equation of the Langevin-Schrodinger type. Two linearly coupled oscillators that randomly interact with the environment and with each other are selected as QS. In the case when the interactions obey the law of a white random process, all the construction of the statistical parameters of the QS and its environment are performed analytically in the form of double integrals and solutions of second-order partial differential equations. Expressions of time-dependent von Neumann entropy and its generalization are obtained, taking into account the self-organization and entanglement processes occurring in the JS. It is mathematically proved that as a result of the relaxation of JS in the TB, a small quantized environment is formed, which can be interpreted as a continuation of QS or its halo. Bel...
Nonequilibrium entropic temperature and its lower bound for quantum stochastic processes
Physical Review E, 2014
In this paper, we have studied the Shannon "entropic" nonequilibrium temperature (NET) of quantum Brownian systems. The Brownian particle is attached to either a bosonic or fermionic bath. Based on the Fokker-Planck description of the c-number quantum Langevin equation, we have calculated entropy production, NET, and their bounds. Entropy production (EP), the upper bound of entropy production (UBEP), and the deviation of the UBEP from EP monotonically decrease as functions of time to equilibrium value for both of the thermal baths. The deviation decreases with increase of temperature of the bosonic thermal bath, but it becomes larger as the temperature of the fermionic bath grows. We also observe that nonequilibrium temperature and its lower bound monotonically increase to equilibrium value with the progression of time. But their difference as a function of time shows an optimum behavior in most cases. Finally, we have observed that at long time, the entropic temperature (for a bosonic thermal bath) first increases nonlinearly as a function of thermodynamic temperature (TT) and, if the TT is appreciably large, then it grows linearly. But for the fermionic thermal bath, the entropic temperature decreases monotonically as a nonlinear function of thermodynamic temperature to zero value.
Stochastic Thermodynamics: A Dynamical Systems Approach
Entropy
In this paper, we develop an energy-based, large-scale dynamical system model driven by Markov diffusion processes to present a unified framework for statistical thermodynamics predicated on a stochastic dynamical systems formalism. Specifically, using a stochastic state space formulation, we develop a nonlinear stochastic compartmental dynamical system model characterized by energy conservation laws that is consistent with statistical thermodynamic principles. In particular, we show that the difference between the average supplied system energy and the average stored system energy for our stochastic thermodynamic model is a martingale with respect to the system filtration. In addition, we show that the average stored system energy is equal to the mean energy that can be extracted from the system and the mean energy that can be delivered to the system in order to transfer it from a zero energy level to an arbitrary nonempty subset in the state space over a finite stopping time.
Perspective on quantum thermodynamics
2016
Classical thermodynamics is unrivalled in its range of applications and relevance to everyday life. It enables a description of complex systems,made up ofmicroscopic particles, in terms of a small number ofmacroscopic quantities, such aswork and entropy. As systems get ever smaller, fluctuations of these quantities become increasingly relevant, prompting the development of stochastic thermodynamics. Recently we have seen a surge of interest in exploring the quantum regime, where the origin offluctuations is quantum rather than thermal.Many questions, such as the role of entanglement and the emergence of thermalisation, lie wide open. Answering these questionsmay lead to the development of quantumheat engines and refrigerators, as well as to vitally needed simple descriptions of quantummany-body systems.