The minimal temperature of Quantum Refrigerators

Abstract

A first principle reciprocating quantum refrigerator is investigated with the purpose of determining the limitations of cooling to absolute zero. We find that if the energy spectrum of the working medium possesses an uncontrollable gap, then there is a minimum achievable temperature above zero. The reason is that such a gap, combined with a negligible amount of noise, prevents adiabatic following during the expansion stage which is necessary condition for reaching T_c --> 0.

12 pages 3 figures in one file.tar form

References in corpus (6)

• Characteristics of the Limit Cycle of a Reciprocating Quantum Heat Engine
• Quantum Lubrication: Suppression of Friction in a First Principle Four Stroke Heat Engine
• The Quantum Refrigerator: The quest for absolute zero
• Damagnetization cooling of a gas
• Depolarisation cooling of an atomic cloud
• Weak measurements in quantum mechanics

Cited by in corpus (13)

• Quantum Thermodynamics
• Minimal universal quantum heat machine
• Thermodynamics of quantum systems under dynamical control
• Quantum bath refrigeration towards absolute zero: unattainability principle challenged
• Fast and robust population transfer in two-level quantum systems with dephasing noise and/or systematic frequency errors
• Short Time Cycles of Purely Quantum Refrigerators
• Optimal thermodynamic control in open quantum systems
• Geometrical bounds on irreversibility in open quantum systems
• Squeezing as the source of inefficiency in the quantum Otto cycle
• Dynamical Casimir effect and minimal temperature in quantum thermodynamics
• The interplay between cycle geometry and performance of sudden refrigerators
• Mitigating controller noise in quantum gates using optimal control theory
• Geometry of local quantum dissipation and fundamental limits to local cooling