Energetic advantages of non-adiabatic drives combined with non-thermal quantum states

TL;DR

This paper explores how non-adiabatic quantum drives combined with non-thermal initial states can provide energetic advantages, emphasizing the role of quantum coherences and non-adiabatic dynamics in quantum thermodynamics.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of non-cyclic ergotropy to quantify energetic gains from initial quantum states, highlighting the benefits of coherences and non-adiabatic processes.

Findings

Quantum coherences always enhance energetic gains.

Non-passive population distributions do not systematically improve energy extraction.

Non-adiabatic dynamics enable access to energetic advantages not available in adiabatic processes.

Abstract

Unitary drivings of quantum systems are ubiquitous in experiments and applications of quantum mechanics and the underlying energetic aspects, particularly relevant in quantum thermodynamics, are receiving growing attention. We investigate energetic advantages in unitary driving obtained from initial non-thermal states. We introduce the non-cyclic ergotropy to quantify the energetic gains, from which coherent (coherence-based) and incoherent (population-based) contributions are identified. In particular, initial quantum coherences appear to be always beneficial whereas non-passive population distributions not systematically. Additionally, these energetic gains are accessible only through non-adiabatic dynamics, contrasting with the usual optimality of adiabatic dynamics for initial thermal states. Finally, following frameworks established in the context of shortcut-to-adiabaticity, the energetic cost related to the implementation of the optimal drives are analysed and, in most situations, are found to be smaller than the energetic cost associated with shortcut-to-adiabaticity. We treat explicitly the example of a two-level system and show that energetic advantages increase with larger initial coherences, illustrating the interplay between initial coherences and the ability of the dynamics to consume and use coherences.