# Spin quantum heat engines with shortcuts to adiabaticity

## TL;DR

This paper investigates a quantum Otto engine using spin-1/2 systems, employing shortcut-to-adiabaticity techniques to improve performance in finite time compared to traditional adiabatic and non-adiabatic cycles.

## Contribution

It introduces a shortcut-to-adiabaticity method for quantum heat engines and evaluates its effectiveness and cost in finite-time quantum Otto cycles.

## Key findings

- Shortcut-to-adiabaticity enhances engine performance
- Performance surpasses true adiabatic and non-adiabatic cycles
- Significant improvement across various figures of merit

## Abstract

We consider a finite-time quantum Otto cycle with single and two-spin-$1/2$ systems as its working medium. In order to mimic adiabatic dynamics at a finite-time, we employ a shortcut-to-adiabaticity technique and evaluate the performance of the engine including the cost of the shortcut. We compare our results with the true adiabatic and non-adiabatic performances of the same cycle. Our findings clearly indicate that the use of shortcut-to-adiabaticity scheme significantly enhances the performance of the quantum Otto engine as compared to its adiabatic and non-adiabatic counterparts for different figures of merit.