Negative temperatures and population inversion

Stefan Machlup

Negative absolute temperature, defined in terms of the Boltzmann factor, corresponds to an upside-down energy pyramid. The example of the laser shows population inversion to be accompanied by the switch from absorption to emission, that is, from positive to negative dissipation, from increasing disorder throughout a system to increasing order in a subsystem. Early treatments of the negative-temperature concept are by Onsager and by Ramsey. Ramsey’s ’’essential requirements’’ are shown to be too strong. A TS diagram for a Carnot cycle operating between two negative temperatures clarifies the origin of amplification. Some biological negative-resistance amplifiers (nerve, muscle), in particular those involving ordered arrays of water molecules, are conjectured to have negative-temperature subsystems.

V. B. Krasovit︠s︡kiĭ, A.R. Linetskii

Rogério J. de Assis, Taysa Mendes de Mendonça, Celso J. Villas-Bôas +4 more

We perform an experiment in which a quantum heat engine works under two reservoirs, one at a positive spin temperature and the other at an effective negative spin temperature, i.e., when the spin system presents population inversion. We show that the efficiency of this engine can be greater than that when both reservoirs are at positive temperatures. We also demonstrate the counterintuitive result that the Otto efficiency can be beaten only when the quantum engine is operating in the finite-time mode.

Galina Nemova

Prem Ballabh Bisht

Iliya V. Doronin, A. A. Zyablovsky, E. S. Andrianov +2 more

We propose an approach to obtain lasing without inversion, which does not require preparation of the quantum superposition of states in the active medium. We demonstrate that with periodically variable pumping, lasing is achievable even in the case when the population inversion of the active medium is always negative. This is possible due to the fact that laser in strong-coupling regime is a non-Hermitian system with an exceptional point existing at negative value of population inversion. We show that due to nonorthogonality of eigenstates near the exceptional point, the time variation of pump power can result in parametric instability in the laser and excitation of the electromagnetic field self-oscillations. These oscillations take place even when the population inversion of the active medium is always negative. Our results help to pave the way for the creation of a new class of lasers operating at negative value of population inversion.