"Heat Flowing from Cold to Hot without External Intervention" Demystified: Thermal-Transformer and Temperature Oscillator

TL;DR

This paper critically analyzes and demystifies claims of heat flowing from cold to hot without external work, clarifying that all refrigeration involves work transfer from higher to lower temperatures, consistent with thermodynamics.

Contribution

It provides a detailed critique of recent claims, clarifying misconceptions and emphasizing that heat transfer from cold to hot without external work is not possible.

Findings

Claims of heat flow from cold to hot without work are unfounded.

Refrigeration always involves work transfer from higher to lower temperatures.

The supposed 'thermal transformer' and 'temperature oscillator' do not violate thermodynamic principles.

Abstract

A recent Science Advances paper by Schilling et al, claiming "flow of heat from cold to hot without intervention" with "oscillatory thermal inertia" are fundamentally misplaced and dramatized as miraculous, even though compliance with the Second Law of thermodynamics is acknowledged. There is nothing "magical and beyond the proof-of-concept" as claimed. It could have been achieved by any work generating device, stored by any suitable device (superconductive inductor was beneficial but not essential as claimed), and such stored work used subsequently in any refrigeration device to sub-cool the body. Cooling devices work by transforming temperature to desired level by work transfer (thermal transformer and temperature oscillator), by non-thermal, adiabatic processes. However, the "direct heat transfer" is always from higher to lower temperature in all refrigeration components, without exception - it is not to be confused by "net-transport of thermal energy by work" from cold to hot ambients. The unjustified claims are critically analyzed and demystified here.