Railway switch transport model

Abstract

We propose a simple model of coupled heat and particle transport based on a zero-dimensional classical deterministic dynamics which is reminiscent of a railway switch whose action is only a function of the particle's energy. It is shown that already in the minimal three-terminal model, where the second terminal is considered as a probe with zero net particle and heat currents, one can find extremely asymmetric Onsager matrices as a consequence of time-reversal symmetry breaking of the model. This minimalistic transport model provides a better understanding of thermoelectric heat engines in the presence of time-reversal symmetry breaking.

5 pages, 3 figures

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Cited by in corpus (5)

• Strong bounds on Onsager coefficients and efficiency for three terminal thermoelectric transport in a magnetic field
• Thermoelectric efficiency of three-terminal quantum thermal machines
• Efficiency of three-terminal thermoelectric transport under broken-time reversal symmetry
• Bound on Thermoelectric Power in a Magnetic Field within Linear Response
• Separation of heat and charge currents for boosted thermoelectric conversion