Concepts from information theory are used to investigate the relation between measurement and irreversibility in finite, closed classical systems having known Hamiltonians. The effects of measurement upon the predictions of the observer are found for the cases of a single measurement, two simultaneous measurements, and two measurements at different times. The physical basis of coarse graining and the significance of the increase in the coarse-grained entropy are discussed. An evolution equation is obtained describing the probability distribution of the measured quantities, and it is shown that this equation is non-Markoffian. Despite this non-Markoffian behavior, the distribution may behave irreversibly and may approach equilibrium. Thus, irreversible behavior is obtained without continual coarse graining. The condition for irreversible behavior is given for the case of a single measurement. The thermodynamic entropy is defined for general nonequilibrium situations.
Concepts from information theory are used to investigate the relation between measurement and irreversibility in finite, closed classical systems having known Hamiltonians. The effects of measurement upon the predictions of the observer are found for the cases of a single measurement, two simultaneous measurements, and two measurements at different times. The physical basis of coarse graining and the significance of the increase in the coarse-grained entropy are discussed. An evolution equation is obtained describing the probability distribution of the measured quantities, and it is shown that this equation is non-Markoffian. Despite this non-Markoffian behavior, the distribution may behave irreversibly and may approach equilibrium. Thus, irreversible behavior is obtained without continual coarse graining. The condition for irreversible behavior is given for the case of a single measurement. The thermodynamic entropy is defined for general nonequilibrium situations.
In view of the fact that physical measurements represent transmission of information, a general definition based on the measure of lack of knowledge in information theory can be introduced for different entropies each of them corresponding to one particular kind of measurement. By means of this entropy concept the problem of the consistency of microscopic reversibility and maeroscopic irreversibility is studied. Under certain conditions it can be shown that the reversible microscopic equation of motion leads to the result that all entropies corresponding to reduced quantities, i.e., to quantities which do not determine the microscopic state of the system completely, can never decrease. However, it is to be noted that this behavior is symmetric in time, in the classical as well as in the quantum mechanical case. Irreversibility is so related on the one hand to incomplete description of a system, but on the other also to the fact that theoretical statements can be verified by experiments in the future only. The validity of the results obtained within the framework of ensemble theory for a single physical system is dtscussed. As applications of the general ideas a system of free particles and the Boltzmann gas are treated. (auth)
We investigate fundamental connections between thermodynamics and quantum information theory. First, we show that the operational framework of thermal operations is nonequivalent to the framework of Gibbs-preserving maps, and we comment on this gap. We then introduce a fully information-theoretic framework generalizing the above by making further abstraction of physical quantities such as energy. It is technically convenient to work with and reproduces known results for finite-size quantum thermodynamics. With our framework we may determine the minimal work cost of implementing any logical process. In the case of information processing on memory registers with a degenerate Hamiltonian, the answer is given by the max-entropy, a measure of information known from quantum information theory. In the general case, we obtain a new information measure, the "coherent relative entropy", which generalizes both the conditional entropy and the relative entropy. It satisfies a collection of properties which justifies its interpretation as an entropy measure and which connects it to known quantities. We then present how, from our framework, macroscopic thermodynamics emerges by typicality, after singling out an appropriate class of thermodynamic states possessing some suitable reversibility property. A natural thermodynamic potential emerges, dictating possible state transformations, and whose differential describes the physics of the system. The textbook thermodynamics of a gas is recovered as well as the form of the second law relating thermodynamic entropy and heat exchange. Finally, noting that quantum states are relative to the observer, we see that the procedure above gives rise to a natural form of coarse-graining in quantum mechanics: Each observer can consistently apply the formalism of quantum information according to their own fundamental unit of information.
In view of the fact that physical measurements represent transmission of information, a general definition based on the measure of “lack of knowledge” in information theory can be introduced for different entropies each of them corresponding to one particular kind of measurement. By means of this entropy concept the problem of the consistency of microscopic reversibility and macroscopic irreversibility is studied. Under certain conditions it can be shown that the reversible microscopic equation of motion leads to the result that all entropies corresponding to “reduced” quantities, i.e. to quantities which do not determine the microscopic state of the system completely, can never decrease. However, it is to be noted that this behaviour is symmetric in time, in the classical as well as in the quantum mechanical case. Irreversibility is so related on the one hand to incomplete description of a system, but on the other also to the fact that theoretical statements can be verified by experiments in the future only. The validity of the results obtained within the framework of ensemble theory for a single physical system is discussed. As applications of the general ideas a system of free particles and the BOLTZMANN gas are treated.
We extend classical coarse-grained entropy, commonly used in many branches of physics, to the quantum realm. We find two coarse grainings, one using measurements of local particle numbers and then total energy, and the second using local energy measurements, which lead to an entropy that is defined outside of equilibrium, is in accord with the thermodynamic entropy for equilibrium systems, and reaches the thermodynamic entropy in the long-time limit, even in genuinely isolated quantum systems. This answers the long-standing conceptual problem, as to which entropy is relevant for the formulation of the second thermodynamic law in closed quantum systems. This entropy could be in principle measured, especially now that experiments on such systems are becoming feasible.
We build a framework for the thermodynamics of macroscopic quantum systems. In contrast with approaches requiring access to the full density matrix, our framework relies on a coarse-grained description, based on measurement statistics of a few observables. When these observables commute, the outcomes define classical macrostates whose entropy is quantified by observational entropy, accounting for uncertainty about both the macrostate and the microstate within it. We extend this notion to non-commuting observables forming a subalgebra of the operator space, and use Jaynes' principle to define an algebra-dependent entropy interpolating between von Neumann and observational entropies. Given initial and final measurement sets, connected by internal and/or environment-induced dynamics, we derive a second law for the coarse-grained dynamics. Unlike formulations based on von Neumann entropy, our inequality captures irreversibility from both non-unitary environment-induced dynamics and internal equilibration. It takes the usual form of a positive entropy production when the system is initially at internal equilibrium, while correction terms capture nonequilibrium resources ignored by the coarse-graining. We also derive fluctuation theorems for coarse-grained thermodynamic quantities. Along a quasi-static path of measurement schemes, we identify quantum macroscopic notions of work and heat fulfilling the first and second laws, including an additional work contribution from manipulating the algebra to which the system is confined, through external constraints or quantum measurement backaction. Finally, we apply our framework to examples illustrating the impact of varying the coarse-graining scheme. Our approach unifies macroscopic and stochastic thermodynamics in a genuinely quantum framework, laying the basis for a versatile, experimentally friendly toolbox to analyze complex quantum dynamics.
Our everyday descriptions of the universe are highly coarse grained, following only a tiny fraction of the variables necessary for a perfectly fine-grained description. Coarse graining in classical physics is made natural by our limited powers of observation and computation. But in the modern quantum mechanics of closed systems, some measure of coarse graining is inescapable because there are no nontrivial, probabilistic, fine-grained descriptions. This essay explores the consequences of that fact. Quantum theory allows for various coarse-grained descriptions, some of which are mutually incompatible. For most purposes, however, we are interested in the small subset of “quasiclassical descriptions” defined by ranges of values of averages over small volumes of densities of conserved quantities such as energy and momentum and approximately conserved quantities such as baryon number. The near-conservation of these quasiclassical quantities results in approximate decoherence, predictability, and local equilibrium, leading to closed sets of equations of motion. In any description, information is sacrificed through the coarse graining that yields decoherence and gives rise to probabilities for histories. In quasiclassical descriptions, further information is sacrificed in exhibiting the emergent regularities summarized by classical equations of motion. An appropriate entropy measures the loss of information. For a “quasiclassical realm” this is connected with the usual thermodynamic entropy as obtained from statistical mechanics. It was low for the initial state of our universe and has been increasing since.