A Quantum Damper

TL;DR

This paper introduces a minimal quantum damper model where a quantum harmonic oscillator interacts with a quantum chaos system, demonstrating long-term, irreversible energy conversion linked to entanglement, despite the system's unitary evolution.

Contribution

It presents a novel minimal model of a quantum damper showing irreversible energy transfer in a purely quantum, unitary system, highlighting the role of entanglement.

Findings

Stationary energy conversion over long timescales

Dependence of duration time on driving strength

Irreversible energy transfer in a unitary quantum system

Abstract

As an application of the classically decayable correlation in a quantum chaos system maintained over an extremely long time-scale (Matsui et al, Europhys.Lett. 113(2016),40008), we propose a minimal model of quantum damper composed of a quantum harmonic oscillator (HO) weakly interacting with a bounded quantum chaos system. Although the whole system obeys unitary evolution dynamics of only three quantum degrees of freedom, the mechanical work applied to the HO is stationary converted into the "internal energy" characterized by an effective temperature in an irreversible way over a sufficiently long time-scale, if the components of the quantum chaos system are mutually entangled enough. A paradoxical dependence of the duration time of the stationary conversion on the driving strength is also discussed.