Certifying quantum enhancements in thermal machines beyond the Thermodynamic Uncertainty Relation
arXiv:2403.19280 · doi:10.22331/q-2025-10-07-1878
Abstract
Quantum coherence has been shown to impact the operational capabilities of quantum systems performing thermodynamic tasks in a significant way, and yet the possibility and conditions for genuine coherence-enhanced thermodynamic operation remain unclear. Introducing a comparison with classical machines using the same set of thermodynamic resources, we show that for steady-state quantum thermal machines -- both autonomous and externally driven -- that interact weakly with thermal reservoirs and work sources, the presence of coherence induced by perturbations in the machine Hamiltonian guarantees a genuine thermodynamic advantage under mild conditions. This advantage applies to both cases where the induced coherence is between levels with different energies or between degenerate levels. On the other hand, we show that engines subjected to noise-induced coherence can be outperformed by classical stochastic engines using exactly the same set of (incoherent) resources. We illustrate our results with three prototypical models of heat engines and refrigerators: the three-level amplifier, the three-qubit autonomous refrigerator, and a noise-induced-coherence machine.
arXiv comment14+16 pages, 6+1 figures
References in corpus (66)
- Nonequilibrium fluctuations, fluctuation theorems, and counting statistics in quantum systems
- Thermodynamic uncertainty relation for biomolecular processes
- Open Quantum Systems. An Introduction
- A single-atom heat engine
- Dissipation bounds all steady-state current fluctuations
- Quantum heat engines and refrigerators: Continuous devices
- How small can thermal machines be? The smallest possible refrigerator
- Quantum Equivalence and Quantum Signatures in Heat Engines
- Experimental demonstration of quantum effects in the operation of microscopic heat engines
- Universal trade-off between power, efficiency, and constancy in steady-state heat engines
- Irreversible entropy production, from quantum to classical
- Stochastic thermodynamics under coarse-graining
- Quantum and Information Thermodynamics: A Unifying Framework based on Repeated Interactions
- Quantum-enhanced absorption refrigerators
- Markovian master equations for quantum thermal machines: local vs global approach
- Three-Terminal Energy Harvester with Coupled Quantum Dots
- The Quantum Absorption Refrigerator
- Reconciliation of quantum local master equations with thermodynamics
- Quantum absorption refrigerator with trapped ions
- Quantum thermodynamic devices: from theoretical proposals to experimental reality
- Entanglement enhances cooling in microscopic quantum fridges
- Virtual qubits, virtual temperatures, and the foundations of thermodynamics
- Nonequilibrium fluctuations in quantum heat engines: Theory, example, and possible solid state experiments
- Performance bound for quantum absorption refrigerators
- Coherence-assisted single-shot cooling by quantum absorption refrigerators
- Quantum thermodynamic cooling cycle
- Perturbative treatment of inter-site couplings in the local description of open quantum networks
- Minimal Self-Contained Quantum Refrigeration Machine Based on Four Quantum Dots
- Autonomous Quantum Refrigerator in a Circuit-QED Architecture Based on a Josephson Junction
- Autonomous quantum thermal machine for generating steady-state entanglement
- Quantum fluctuation theorems for arbitrary environments: adiabatic and non-adiabatic entropy production
- Dynamical Control of Quantum Heat Engines Using Exceptional Points
- Quantum heat engine based on photon-assisted Cooper pair tunneling
- Coherence-enhanced constancy of a quantum thermoelectric generator
- The smallest refrigerators can reach maximal efficiency
- Thermodynamic uncertainty relation in quantum thermoelectric junctions
- Violating the Thermodynamic Uncertainty Relation in the Three-Level Maser
- Efficiency at Maximum Power of Laser Quantum Heat Engine Enhanced by Noise-Induced Coherence
- Long-lived quasi-stationary coherences in V-type system driven by incoherent light
- Performance of autonomous quantum thermal machines: Hilbert space dimension as a thermodynamic resource
- Realising a quantum absorption refrigerator with an atom-cavity system
- Signatures of Liouvillian exceptional points in a quantum thermal machine
- Quantum thermodynamically consistent local master equations
- Stochastic thermodynamics of rapidly driven systems
- Optimal performance of endoreversible quantum refrigerators
- Refrigeration beyond weak internal coupling
- Thermodynamics of precision in quantum nano-machines
- Power enhancement of heat engines via correlated thermalization in multilevel systems
- Cooling by Cooper pair splitting
- Nonequilibrium many-body quantum engine driven by time-translation symmetry breaking
- Coherences and the thermodynamic uncertainty relation: Insights from quantum absorption refrigerators
- Inverse counting statistics for stochastic and open quantum systems: the characteristic polynomial approach
- From quantum heat engines to laser cooling: Floquet theory beyond the Born-Markov approximation
- Hybrid Thermal Machines: Generalized Thermodynamic Resources for Multitasking
- Boosting the performance of small autonomous refrigerators via common environmental effects
- Optimal operation of a three-level quantum heat engine and universal nature of efficiency
- Quantum statistics of a single-atom Scovil-Schulz-DuBois heat engine
- Collective effects on the performance and stability of quantum heat engines
- Apparent temperature: demystifying the relation between quantum coherence, correlations, and heat flows
- Effects of noise-induced coherence on the performance of quantum absorption refrigerators
- Photoelectric converters with quantum coherence
- Two-body quantum absorption refrigerators with optomechanical-like interactions
- Quantum coherence enables hybrid multitask and multisource regimes in autonomous thermal machines
- Classical emulation of quantum-coherent thermal machines
- Effects of noise-induced coherence on the fluctuations of current in quantum absorption refrigerators
- Quantum-enhanced performance in superconducting Andreev-reflection engines