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arXiv:1610.01172

Irreversibility and correlations in coupled quantum oscillators

Matteo Brunelli, Mauro Paternostro

Published Oct 4, 2016• 4 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

We investigate the link between the irreversibility generated by a stationary dissipative process and the correlations established within a composite quantum system. We provide two equivalent expressions for the entropy generated in the non-equilibrium steady state of coupled quantum harmonic oscillators that allow for a simple interpretation of the onset of irreversibility. We then unveil a quantitative relation between the entropy production rate and correlations, both total and quantum, built between the two oscillators. In the small-coupling limit, the entropy production rate is shown to be proportional to both the mutual information and the quantum correlations. We apply our results to the analysis of the optomechanical interaction between a nano-mechanical resonator and a cavity field, and show that the behavior of the entropy production captures the peculiar features of the model, such as sideband cooling and amplification.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1610.01172

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Entropy production is a fundamental concept in nonequilibrium thermodynamics, providing a direct measure of the irreversibility inherent in any physical process. In this work, we investigate in steady-state the enhancement of irreversibility employing coherent feedback loop. We evaluate the steady-state entropy production rate and quantum correlations by applying the quantum phase space formulation to calculate the entropy change. Our study reveals the essential contribution of coherent feedback in the thermal bath's input-noise operators, resulting in the system being driven far from thermal equilibrium. Our analysis shows that in the small-coupling limit, the entropy production rate is proportional to the quantum mutual information. We use for application the optomechanical system of Fabry-Pérot cavity, and show that the picks of the entropy production corresponding of the heating/cooling of movable mirror are improved. Therefore, we conclude that irreversibility and quantum correlations are not independent and must be analyzed jointly. The results demonstrate the possibility of enhancement of entropy production and pave the way for promising quantum thermal applications through coherent feedback loop.
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Entropy production quantifies the amount of irreversibility of a physical process, leading to fundamental bounds for thermodynamic quantities. It captures the inability to run a physical system forward and then backward, bringing it to the same initial state. Considerable research has been carried out in the last decades to extend entropy production to non-equilibrium quantum processes. We experimentally investigate the entropy production of such forward-backward cycles affected by genuinely quantum irreversibility. Namely, we consider processes realized to erase different types of correlations between two interacting systems, from obliterating solely quantum coherence to completely decorrelating local states. This makes the measurement of entropy production experimentally challenging. Addressing this challenge is the purpose of this paper.
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