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Maxwell's demon across the quantum-to-classical transition

Annby Andersson, Björn LU ; Bhattacharyya, Debankur ; Bakhshinezhad, Pharnam ; Holst, Daniel LU orcid ; De Sousa, Guilherme ; Jarzynski, Christopher ; Samuelsson, Peter LU and Potts, Patrick LU orcid (2024) In arXiv.org
Abstract
In scenarios coined Maxwell's demon, information on microscopic degrees of freedom is used to seemingly violate the second law of thermodynamics. This has been studied in the classical as well as the quantum domain. In this paper, we study an implementation of Maxwell's demon that can operate in both domains. In particular, we investigate information-to-work conversion over the quantum-to-classical transition. The demon continuously measures the charge state of a double quantum dot, and uses this information to guide electrons against a voltage bias by tuning the on-site energies of the dots. Coherent tunneling between the dots allows for the buildup of quantum coherence in the system. Under strong measurements, the coherence is... (More)
In scenarios coined Maxwell's demon, information on microscopic degrees of freedom is used to seemingly violate the second law of thermodynamics. This has been studied in the classical as well as the quantum domain. In this paper, we study an implementation of Maxwell's demon that can operate in both domains. In particular, we investigate information-to-work conversion over the quantum-to-classical transition. The demon continuously measures the charge state of a double quantum dot, and uses this information to guide electrons against a voltage bias by tuning the on-site energies of the dots. Coherent tunneling between the dots allows for the buildup of quantum coherence in the system. Under strong measurements, the coherence is suppressed, and the system is well-described by a classical model. As the measurement strength is further increased, the Zeno effect prohibits interdot tunneling. A Zeno-like effect is also observed for weak measurements, where measurement errors lead to fluctuations in the on-site energies, dephasing the system. We anticipate similar behaviors in other quantum systems under continuous measurement and feedback control, making our results relevant for implementations in quantum technology and quantum control. (Less)
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author
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organization
publishing date
type
Working paper/Preprint
publication status
published
subject
in
arXiv.org
external identifiers
  • scopus:85210739610
ISSN
2331-8422
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
f0bc146e-01b0-41eb-9447-73c46709493c
alternative location
https://arxiv.org/pdf/2405.09376
date added to LUP
2024-10-17 10:50:02
date last changed
2025-04-04 15:33:07
@misc{f0bc146e-01b0-41eb-9447-73c46709493c,
  abstract     = {{In scenarios coined Maxwell's demon, information on microscopic degrees of freedom is used to seemingly violate the second law of thermodynamics. This has been studied in the classical as well as the quantum domain. In this paper, we study an implementation of Maxwell's demon that can operate in both domains. In particular, we investigate information-to-work conversion over the quantum-to-classical transition. The demon continuously measures the charge state of a double quantum dot, and uses this information to guide electrons against a voltage bias by tuning the on-site energies of the dots. Coherent tunneling between the dots allows for the buildup of quantum coherence in the system. Under strong measurements, the coherence is suppressed, and the system is well-described by a classical model. As the measurement strength is further increased, the Zeno effect prohibits interdot tunneling. A Zeno-like effect is also observed for weak measurements, where measurement errors lead to fluctuations in the on-site energies, dephasing the system. We anticipate similar behaviors in other quantum systems under continuous measurement and feedback control, making our results relevant for implementations in quantum technology and quantum control.}},
  author       = {{Annby Andersson, Björn and Bhattacharyya, Debankur and Bakhshinezhad, Pharnam and Holst, Daniel and De Sousa, Guilherme and Jarzynski, Christopher and Samuelsson, Peter and Potts, Patrick}},
  issn         = {{2331-8422}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  note         = {{Preprint}},
  series       = {{arXiv.org}},
  title        = {{Maxwell's demon across the quantum-to-classical transition}},
  url          = {{https://arxiv.org/pdf/2405.09376}},
  year         = {{2024}},
}