Abstract
Work and quantum correlations are two fundamental resources in thermodynamics and quantum information theory. In this work, we study how to use correlations among quantum systems to optimally store work. We analyze this question for isolated quantum ensembles, where the work can be naturally divided into two contributions: a local contribution from each system and a global contribution originating from correlations among systems. We focus on the latter and consider quantum systems that are locally thermal, thus from which any extractable work can only come from correlations. We compute the maximum extractable work for general entangled states, separable states, and states with fixed entropy. Our results show that while entanglement gives an advantage for small quantum ensembles, this gain vanishes for a large number of systems.Received 31 October 2014DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevX.5.041011This article is available under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article’s title, journal citation, and DOI.Published by the American Physical Society
Highlights
Traditional, macroscopic thermodynamics is strikingly robust to the underlying mechanics: its three laws hold true while switching from classical to quantum mechanics [1]
We focus on the latter and consider quantum systems that are locally thermal, from which any extractable work can only come from correlations
Our results show that while entanglement gives an advantage for small quantum ensembles, this gain vanishes for a large number of systems
Summary
Traditional, macroscopic thermodynamics is strikingly robust to the underlying mechanics: its three laws hold true while switching from classical to quantum mechanics [1]. A problem of particular importance in quantum thermodynamics is to understand which quantum states allow for the storage and extraction of work from quantum systems [23,24]. The total system, is correlated, because otherwise its state would be thermal, passive This is the natural scenario to study the role of correlations for work storage, as they become the only source of nonpassivity. Quantum resources offer a significant advantage only for small n, while neither entanglement nor energy coherences are needed for optimal work storage in the thermodynamic limit. We consider additional natural constraints on the global state, such as limiting the entropy or requiring the decohered (classical) version of the state to be thermal, and investigate the role of quantum coherence and entanglement in these cases. This brings new insights in the quantum-to-classical transition in thermodynamics
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Free) 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a call
