Reservoirs with the same mean relaxation rate can be indistinguishable at the level of average energy transport while producing different fluctuations. We study a bosonic mode coupled to hot and cold Poisson streams of thermal ancillas through finite beam-splitter collisions. The averaged evolution is a compound-Poisson semigroup generated by finite Gaussian event channels. Its nonequilibrium steady state is an exact mixture of thermal states governed by a random affine fixed point. Consequently, the mean-occupation dynamics and bath-resolved mean heat currents coincide with those of the matched continuous Lindblad reservoir, whereas higher correlations retain the collision strength. For equal collision transmissivities, we derive an exact superthermal bunching law controlled by the temperature contrast and collision strength. We also obtain the asymptotic rates of the first two heat cumulants for an ideal stationary event-resolved two-point-measurement record and separate local one-collision contributions from temporal correlations. Fock-space diagonalization and Monte Carlo trajectories validate the formulas and connect full resets to the weak-collision Gaussian limit.
Reservoirs with the same mean relaxation rate can be indistinguishable at the level of average energy transport while producing different fluctuations. We study a bosonic mode coupled to hot and cold Poisson streams of thermal ancillas through finite beam-splitter collisions. The averaged evolution is a compound-Poisson semigroup generated by finite Gaussian event channels. Its nonequilibrium steady state is an exact mixture of thermal states governed by a random affine fixed point. Consequently, the mean-occupation dynamics and bath-resolved mean heat currents coincide with those of the matched continuous Lindblad reservoir, whereas higher correlations retain the collision strength. For equal collision transmissivities, we derive an exact superthermal bunching law controlled by the temperature contrast and collision strength. We also obtain the asymptotic rates of the first two heat cumulants for an ideal stationary event-resolved two-point-measurement record and separate local one-collision contributions from temporal correlations. Fock-space diagonalization and Monte Carlo trajectories validate the formulas and connect full resets to the weak-collision Gaussian limit.
Collision models provide a simple and versatile setting to capture the dynamics of open quantum systems. The standard approach to thermalization in this setting involves an environment of independent and identically prepared thermal qubits, interacting sequentially for a finite duration Δ t with the system. We compare this to a two-bath scenario in which collisional qubits are prepared in either their ground or excited states and the environment temperature is encoded in system-environment couplings. The system reaches the same thermal steady state for both settings, although even in this limit they describe fundamentally different physical processes, with the two-bath setup yielding a nonequilibrium state with finite heat currents. Non-Markovian dynamics arises when intraenvironment interactions in either setting are introduced. Here the system in the single-bath setup again reaches a steady state at the canonical temperature of the bath, but the nonequilibrium steady state of the two-bath setup tends to a different temperature due to the generation of strong system-environment and intraenvironment correlations. The two-bath setting is particularly suited to studying quantum trajectories, which are well defined also for the non-Markovian case. We showcase this with a trajectory analysis of the heat currents within a two-point measurement scheme. Finally, we consider how our results are impacted when the system-environment interaction leads to strict homogenization. Our results provide insights into the dynamics and thermodynamics of thermalization towards nonequilibrium steady states and the role of non-Markovian interactions.
Recently, a "unified" quantum master equation was derived and shown to be of the Gorini-Kossakowski-Lindblad-Sudarshan form. This equation describes the dynamics of open quantum systems in a manner that forgoes the full secular approximation and retains the impact of coherences between eigenstates close in energy. We implement full counting statistics with the unified quantum master equation to investigate the statistics of energy currents through open quantum systems with nearly degenerate levels. We show that, in general, this equation gives rise to dynamics that satisfy fluctuation symmetry, a sufficient condition for the Second Law of Thermodynamics at the level of average fluxes. For systems with nearly degenerate energy levels, such that coherences build up, the unified equation is simultaneously thermodynamically consistent and more accurate than the fully secular master equation. We exemplify our results for a "V" system facilitating energy transport between two thermal baths at different temperatures. We compare the statistics of steady-state heat currents through this system as predicted by the unified equation to those given by the Redfield equation, which is less approximate but, in general, not thermodynamically consistent. We also compare results to the secular equation, where coherences are entirely abandoned. We find that maintaining coherences between nearly degenerate levels is essential to properly capture the current and its cumulants. On the other hand, the relative fluctuations of the heat current, which embody the thermodynamic uncertainty relation, display inconsequential dependence on quantum coherences.
This is the second of a series of three papers examining how viable it is for entanglement to be sustained at high temperatures for quantum systems in thermal equilibrium (Case A), in nonequilibrium (Case B) and in nonequilibrium steady state (NESS) conditions (Case C). The system we analyze here consists of two coupled quantum harmonic oscillators each interacting with its own bath described by a scalar field, set at temperatures T 1 > T 2. For constant bilinear inter-oscillator coupling studied here (Case C1) owing to the Gaussian nature, the problem can be solved exactly at arbitrary temperatures even for strong coupling. We find that the valid entanglement criterion in general is not a function of the bath temperature difference, in contrast to thermal transport in the same NESS setting [1]. Thus lowering the temperature of one of the thermal baths does not necessarily help to safeguard the entanglement between the oscillators. Indeed, quantum entanglement will disappear if any one of the thermal baths has a temperature higher than the critical temperature T c, defined as the temperature above which quantum entanglement vanishes. With the Langevin equations derived we give a full display of how entanglement dynamics in this system depends on T 1, T 2, the inter-oscillator coupling and the system-bath coupling strengths. For weak oscillator-bath coupling the critical temperature T c is about the order of the inverse oscillator frequency, but for strong oscillator-bath coupling it will depend on the bath cutoff frequency. We conclude that in most realistic circumstances, for bosonic systems in NESS with constant bilinear coupling, ‘hot entanglement’ is largely a fiction.
We investigate nonequilibrium steady states of driven-dissipative ideal quantum gases of both bosons and fermions. We focus on systems of sharp particle number that are driven out of equilibrium either by the coupling to several heat baths of different temperature or by time-periodic driving in combination with the coupling to a heat bath. Within the framework of (Floquet-)Born-Markov theory, several analytical and numerical methods are described in detail. This includes a mean-field theory in terms of occupation numbers, an augmented mean-field theory taking into account also nontrivial two-particle correlations, and quantum-jump-type Monte Carlo simulations. For the case of the ideal Fermi gas, these methods are applied to simple lattice models and the possibility of achieving exotic states via bath engineering is pointed out. The largest part of this work is devoted to bosonic quantum gases and the phenomenon of Bose selection, a nonequilibrium generalization of Bose condensation, where multiple single-particle states are selected to acquire a large occupation [Phys. Rev. Lett. 111, 240405 (2013)]. In this context, among others, we provide a theory for transitions where the set of selected states changes, describe an efficient algorithm for finding the set of selected states, investigate beyond-mean-field effects, and identify the dominant mechanisms for heat transport in the Bose-selected state.
A general formalism for computing the full counting statistics of energy exchanged between ``N'' squeezed thermal photon reservoirs weakly coupled to a cavity with ``M'' photon modes is presented. The formalism is based on the two-point measurement scheme and is applied to two simple special cases: the relaxation dynamics of a single mode cavity in contact with a single squeezed thermal photon reservoir and the steady-state energy transport between two squeezed thermal photon reservoirs coupled to a single cavity mode. Using analytical results, it is found that the short time energy exchange statistics is significantly affected by noncommutativity of the initial energy measurements with the reservoirs' squeezed states, and may lead to negative probabilities if not accounted for properly. Furthermore, it is found that for the single reservoir setup, generically there is no transient or steady-state Jarzynski-W\'ojcik energy exchange fluctuation theorem. In contrast, for the two reservoir cases, although there is no generic transient energy exchange fluctuation theorem, a steady-state energy exchange fluctuation theorem with a nonuniversal affinity is found to be valid. Statistics of energy currents are further discussed.
We investigate the superfluid dynamics of a Josephson junction beyond the mean-field description, incorporating the role of thermal fluctuations as well as quantum fluctuations. Using a formalism that accounts for the fluctuations in a homogeneous gas, and under the assumption that the transport of the non-condensed component is negligible, we derive a corrected equation of motion within the two-site approximation. The resulting corrections for the typical dynamical quantities, like the Josephson frequency, the strength of macroscopic quantum self-trapping, and the threshold for spontaneous symmetry breaking, allow us to predict the effects of both types of fluctuations and assess their relative importance in different regimes in a semianalytical fashion. For all the dynamical quantities, the quantum fluctuations are shown to play an opposite role with respect to the thermal fluctuations. Josephson frequency is decreased by thermal fluctuations and both the critical strenghts of macroscopic quantum self trapping and spontaneous symmetry breaking are increased. We assess the experimentally accessible regimes by calculating the relevant parameters of recent experimental realizations of Bosonic Josephson junction and show that the expected regime is dominated by quantum fluctuations.