We investigate a quantum Otto engine with a quantum Ising spin glass as the working medium to explore the scaling behavior of work output and thermodynamic performance concerning system size, particularly near the critical point. Specifically, we explore the two operating modes of the Otto engine, namely the heat engine and refrigerator modes. We observe a double-peaked structure in the heat engine regime, leading to superlinear scaling in both work output and thermodynamic performance near the critical point. Additionally, in the refrigerator regime, superlinear scaling in refrigerator efficiency can be achieved at high and low temperatures, significantly outperforming models with uniform Ising interactions. These findings suggest that disorder and frustration in quantum Ising spin-glass systems could significantly impact thermodynamic performance in quantum heat engines and refrigerators, potentially opening up new avenues for improvement.
Efficiency Enhancement up to Unity in a Generalized Quantum Otto Engine: Comparative Analysis with Conventional Quantum Otto Engine Utilizing a Two-Qubit Heisenberg XXZ Chain
We suggest alternative quantum Otto engines, using heat bath algorithmic cooling with partner pairing algorithm instead of isochoric cooling. Liquid state nuclear magnetic resonance systems in one entropy sink are considered as working fluids. Then, the extractable work and thermal efficiency are analyzed in detail for four-stroke and two-stroke type of quantum Otto engines. The role of heat bath algorithmic cooling in these cycles is to use a single entropy sink instead of two. Also, this cooling algorithm increases the power of engines reducing the time required for one cycle.
We construct an entangled quantum Otto engine based on spin-1/2 systems undergoing Dzyaloshinski-Moriya (DM) interaction within a varying magnetic field. We investigate the influence of the DM interaction on basic thermodynamic quantities, including heat transfer, work done, and efficiency and find that the DM interaction importantly influences the engine's thermodynamics. We obtain an expression for engine efficiency, finding it to yield the same efficiency for antiferromagnetic and ferromagnetic coupling. A new upper bound, nontrivially consistent with the second law of thermodynamics, is de…
We consider a quantum Otto cycle operating between two squeezed thermal reservoirs. The influences of the squeezing degree on the optimization performance of quantum Otto heat engines and refrigerators are investigated. We demonstrate that under symmetric condition, the efficiency at maximum power (EMP) of heat engines and the coefficient of performance (COP) at maximum \c{hi} criterion of refrigerators are equal to Curzon-Ahlborn (CA) efficiency and CA COP, respectively. We also found that under asymmetric condition, the EMP of heat engines can be improved when the squeezing degree of hot the…
Abstract We perform an experiment in which a quantum heat engine works under two reservoirs, one at a positive spin temperature and the other at an effective negative spin temperature i.e., when the spin system presents population inversion. We show that the efficiency of this engine can be greater than that when both reservoirs are at positive temperatures. We also demonstrate the counter-intuitive result that the Otto efficiency can be beaten only when the quantum engine is operating in the finite-time mode.
Recent theoretical and experimental studies in quantum heat engines show that, in the quasi-static regime, it is possible to have higher efficiency than the limit imposed by Carnot, provided that engineered reservoirs are used. The quasi-static regime, however, is a strong limitation to the operation of heat engines, since infinitely long time is required to complete a cycle. In this paper we propose a two-level model as the working substance to perform a quantum Otto heat engine surrounded by a cold thermal reservoir and a squeezed hot thermal reservoir. Taking advantage of this model we show…
We demonstrate how a quantum Otto engine (QOE) can be implemented using a single ion and an always-on thermal environment. The internal degree of freedom of the ion is chosen as the working fluid, while the motional degree of freedom can be used as the cold bath. We show, that by adiabatically changing the local magnetic field, the work efficiency can be asymptotically made unity. We propose a projective measurement of the internal state of the ion that mimics the release of heat into the cold bath during the engine cycle. In our proposal, the coupling to the hot and the cold baths need not be…
We investigate the quantum thermodynamic cycle of a quantum heat engine carrying out an Otto thermodynamic cycle. We use the thermal properties of a moving heat bath with relativistic velocity with respect to the cold bath. As a working medium, we use a two-level system and a harmonic oscillator that interact with a moving heat bath and a static cold bath. In the current work, the quantum heat engine is studied in the high and low temperatures regime. Using quantum thermodynamics and the theory of open quantum system we obtain the total produced work, the efficiency and the efficiency at maxim…
We analyze the performance of a quantum Otto cycle, employing time-dependent harmonic oscillator as the working fluid undergoing sudden expansion and compression strokes during the adiabatic stages, coupled to a squeezed reservoir. First, we show that the maximum efficiency that our engine can achieve is 1/2 only, which is in contrast with the earlier studies claiming unit efficiency under the effect of squeezed reservoir. Then, we obtain analytic expressions for the upper bound on the efficiency as well as on the coefficient of performance of the Otto cycle. The obtained bounds are independen…
The working substance fueling a quantum heat engine may contain coherence in its energy basis, depending on the dynamics of the engine cycle. In some models of quantum Otto heat engines, energy coherence has been associated with entropy production and quantum friction. We considered a quantum Otto heat engine operating at finite time. Coherence is generated and the working substance does not reach thermal equilibrium after interacting with the hot heat reservoir, leaving the working substance in a state with residual energy coherence. We observe an interference-like effect between the residual…
Conducting an open quantum system towards a desired steady state through reservoir engineering is a remarkable task that takes dissipation and decoherence as tools rather than impediments. Here we develop a collisional model to implement reservoir engineering for the one-dimensional harmonic motion of a trapped ion. Our scheme is based on the pulsed interaction between the vibrational mode and the electronic levels of a trapped ion, which is promoted by resolved-sideband lasers. Having multiple internal levels, we show that multiple reservoirs can be engineered, allowing for more efficient syn…
We study a quantum Otto engine at finite time, where the working substance is composed of a two-level system interacting with a harmonic oscillator, described by the quantum Rabi model. We obtain the limit cycle and calculate the total work extracted, efficiency, and power of the engine by numerically solving the master equation describing the open system dynamics. We relate the total work extracted and the efficiency at maximum power with the quantum correlations embedded in the working substance, which we consider through entanglement of formation and quantum discord. Interestingly, we find …
We consider a semi-classical heat engine with a $q$-deformed quantum oscillator working substance and classical thermal baths. We investigate the influence of the quantum statistical deformation parameter $q$ on the work and efficiency of the engine. In usual heat engines, a Hamiltonian parameter is varied during the work injection and extraction stages while the quantum statistical character of the working substance remains fixed. We point out that even if the Hamiltonian parameters are not changing, work can be harvested by quantum statistical changes of the working substance. Work extractio…
Equivalence of Discrete and Continuous Otto-Like Engines assisted by Catalysts: Mapping Catalytic Advantages from the Discrete to the Continuous Framework
University of Gdańsk（格但斯克大学）；Los Alamos National Laboratory（洛斯阿拉莫斯国家实验室）
We consider a finite-time quantum Otto heat engine that consists of two isochoric (thermal-contact) process, where the system is alternatively coupled to a hot squeezed and a cold thermal reservoir, and two unitary driven strokes, where the system is isolated from these two baths and its von Neumann entropy keeps constant. Both quantum inner friction and coherence are generated along the driven stroke and coherence cannot be fully erased after the finite-time hot isochore. Using full counting statistics, we present the probability distribution functions of heat injection and total work per cyc…
We assess the energy cost of shortcuts to adiabatic expansions or compressions of a harmonic oscillator, the power strokes of a quantum Otto engine. Difficulties to identify the cost stem from the interplay between different parts of the total system (the primary system -the particle-, and the control system) and definitions of work (exclusive and inclusive). While attention is usually paid to the inclusive work of the primary system, we identify the energy cost as the exclusive work of the total system, which, for a clearcut scale disparity between primary and control systems, coincides with …
We study a quantum Otto engine operating on the basis of a helical spin- 1/2 multiferroic chain with strongly coupled magnetic and ferroelectric order parameters. The presence of a finite spin chirality in the working substance enables steering of the cycle by an external electric field that couples to the electric polarization. We observe a direct connection between the chirality, the entanglement and the efficiency of the engine. An electric-field dependent threshold temperature is identified above which the pair correlations in the system, as quantified by the thermal entanglement, diminish…
Recent experimental breakthroughs produced the first nano heat engines that have the potential to harness quantum resources. An instrumental question is how their performance measures up against the efficiency of classical engines. For single ion engines undergoing quantum Otto cycles it has been found that the efficiency at maximal power is given by the Curzon-Ahlborn efficiency. This is rather remarkable as the Curzon-Alhbron efficiency was originally derived for endoreversible Carnot cycles. Here, we analyze two examples of endoreversible Otto engines within the same conceptual framework as…
The optimization of finite-time thermodynamic heat engines was intensively explored recently, yet limited to few cycles, e.g. finite-time Carnot-like cycle. In this paper, we supplement a new type of finite-time engine with quantum Otto cycle and show the better performance. The current model can be widely utilized benefited from the general \mathcal{C}/τ^{2} scaling of extra work for finite-time adiabatic process with long control time τ. Such scaling allows analytical optimization of the generic finite-time quantum Otto cycle to surpass the efficiency at maximum power for the Carnot-like eng…
Unbounded Work Extraction and Zero Work Fluctuations in a Super-Carnot Otto Information Engine
College of Physics, Jilin University（吉林大学物理学院）；Department of Chemistry and Department of Physics and Astronomy, State University of New York at Stony Brook（纽约州立大学石溪分校化学系和物理与天文学系）
We study the effect of Kerr nonlinearity in quantum thermal machines having a Kerr-nonlinear oscillator as working substance and operating under the ideal quantum Otto cycle. We first investigate the efficiency of a Kerr-nonlinear heat engine and show that by varying the Kerr-nonlinear strength the efficiency surpasses in up to 2.5 times the efficiency of a quantum harmonic oscillator Otto engine. Moreover, the Kerr-nonlinearity makes the coefficient of performance of the Kerr-nonlinear refrigerator to be as large as 3 times the performance of quantum harmonic oscillator Otto refrigerators. Th…
Lipkin-Meshkov-Glick model of two anisotropically interacting spins in a magnetic field is proposed as a working substance of a quantum Otto engine to explore and exploit the anisotropy effects for the optimization of engine operation. Three different cases for the adiabatic branches of the cycle have been considered. In the first two cases, either the magnetic field or coupling strength are changed; while in the third case, both the magnetic field and the coupling strength are changed by the same ratio. The system parameters for which the engine can operate similar to or dramatically differen…
We derive the probability distribution of the efficiency of a quantum Otto engine. We explicitly compute the quantum efficiency statistics for an analytically solvable two-level engine. We analyze the occurrence of values of the stochastic efficiency above unity, in particular at infinity, in the nonadiabatic regime and further determine mean and variance in the case of adiabatic driving. We finally investigate the classical-to-quantum transition as the temperature is lowered.
We study how a quantum heat engine based on a single trapped ion performs in finite time. The always-on thermal environment acts like the hot bath, while the motional degree of freedom of the ion plays the role of the effective cold bath. The hot isochoric stroke is implemented via the interaction of the ion with its hot environment, while a projective measurement of the internal state of the ion is performed as an equivalent to the cold isochoric stroke. The expansion and compression strokes are implemented via suitable change in applied magnetic field. We study in detail how the finite durat…
Overcoming the Quasi-Static Bottleneck: A Finite-Time Quantum Otto Information Engine Achieving Near-Unity Efficiency
College of Physics, Jilin University（吉林大学物理学院）；Department of Chemistry and Department of Physics and Astronomy, State University of New York at Stony Brook（纽约州立大学石溪分校化学系和物理与天文学系）
We investigate quantum Otto engine and refrigeration cycles of a time-dependent harmonic oscillator operating under the conditions of maximum $Ω$-function, a trade-off objective function which represents a compromise between energy benefits and losses for a specific job, for both adiabatic and nonadiabatic (sudden) frequency modulations. We derive analytical expressions for the efficiency and coefficient of performance of the Otto cycle. For the case of adiabatic driving, we point out that in the low-temperature regime, the harmonic Otto engine (refrigerator) can be mapped to Feynman's ratchet…
We propose a quantum Otto cycle based on the properties of a two-level system in a realistic out-of-thermal-equilibrium electromagnetic field acting as its sole reservoir. This steady configuration is produced without the need of active control over the state of the environment, which is a non-coherent thermal radiation, sustained only by external heat supplied to macroscopic objects. Remarkably, even for non-ideal finite-time transformations, it largely over-performs the standard ideal Otto cycle, and asymptotically achieves unit efficiency at finite power.
We study internal work optimization over the energy levels of a generic hot quantum Otto engine. We find universal features in the efficiency that resembles the classical external power optimization over the coupling times to the thermal baths. It is shown that in the ultra hot regime the efficiency is determined solely by the optimization constraint, and independent of the engine details. We show that for some constraints the radius of convergence of the perturbative approach used in the classical analysis is zero even for very arbitrarily low efficiencies at small temperature difference.
We consider a finite-time Otto engine operating on a quantum harmonic oscillator and driven by shortcut-to-adiabaticity (STA) techniques to speed up its cycle. We study its efficiency and power when internal friction, time-averaged work, and work fluctuations are used as quantitative figures of merit, showing that time-averaged efficiency and power are useful cost functions for the characterization of the performance of the engine. We then use the minimum allowed time for validity of STA protocol relation to establish a physically relevant bound to the efficiency at maximum power of the STA-dr…
