Thermodynamics of a physical model implementing a Maxwell demon

TL;DR

This paper models a Maxwell demon using a coupled quantum dot and single electron transistor, analyzing the thermodynamics and information flow involved in the feedback process within a stochastic thermodynamics framework.

Contribution

It provides a physical implementation and thermodynamic analysis of a Maxwell demon system, highlighting the role of information flow in entropy production.

Findings

Identification of a regime where the SET's energetics remain unaffected by detection

Discovery of a new contribution to entropy production due to information flow

Quantitative description of the Maxwell demon feedback in a quantum dot system

Abstract

We present a physical implementation of a Maxwell demon which consists of a conventional single electron transistor (SET) capacitively coupled to another quantum dot detecting its state. Altogether, the system is described by stochastic thermodynamics. We identify the regime where the energetics of the SET is not affected by the detection, but where its coarse-grained entropy production is shown to contain a new contribution compared to the isolated SET. This additional contribution can be identified as the information flow generated by the "Maxwell demon" feedback in an idealized limit.