• Physicists build quantum refrigerator based on four quantum dots

    Updated: 2013-07-09 15:00:02
    (Phys.org) —With the goal of understanding the relation between thermodynamics and quantum mechanics, physicists have recently been investigating the fundamental limits of the smallest possible quantum refrigerator. As a refrigerator, the device must be able to transfer heat from one reservoir to another. In a new study, physicists have proposed a quantum refrigerator consisting of just four quantum dots, each in contact with a thermal reservoir. They theoretically show that this system can extract heat from the coldest reservoir and cool the nearby quantum dot, making it one of the smallest quantum refrigerators proposed to date.

  • Two papers investigate the thermodynamics of quantum systems

    Updated: 2013-07-08 16:10:01
    (Phys.org) —As one of the pillars of the natural sciences, thermodynamics plays an important role in all processes that involve heat, energy, and work. While the principles of thermodynamics can predict the amount of work done in classical systems, for quantum systems there is instead a distribution of many possible values of work. Two new papers published in Physical Review Letters have proposed theoretical schemes that would significantly ease the measurement of the statistics of work done by quantum systems.

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