Second law and Landauer principle far from equilibrium

TL;DR

This paper explores the fundamental thermodynamic limits of work required for state changes in nonequilibrium systems, extending classical principles to far-from-equilibrium conditions.

Contribution

It generalizes the second law and Landauer principle to nonequilibrium states, providing new bounds on work and information in thermodynamic processes.

Findings

Work needed exceeds equilibrium free energy difference in nonequilibrium transitions.

The bounds incorporate information content relative to equilibrium distributions.

Results apply to systems far from equilibrium, broadening classical thermodynamics.

Abstract

The amount of work that is needed to change the state of a system in contact with a heat bath between specified initial and final nonequilibrium states is at least equal to the corresponding equilibrium free energy difference plus (resp. minus) temperature times the information of the final (resp. the initial) state relative to the corresponding equilibrium distributions.