Thermodynamic measurement of non-equilibrium stochastic processes in optical tweezers

TL;DR

This paper experimentally investigates the energetic costs of non-equilibrium processes in optical tweezers using colloidal particles, comparing optimal and sub-optimal protocols and validating results with Jarzynski's relation.

Contribution

It provides the first experimental measurement of energetic costs in driven finite-time protocols in optical tweezers, including validation of stochastic thermodynamics relations.

Findings

Optimal protocols reduce energy expenditure compared to sub-optimal ones.

Experimental data confirms the Jarzynski relation for stochastic trajectories.

Control of trap stiffness influences the energetic cost of protocols.

Abstract

Due to their versatility in investigating phenomena in microscopic scales, optical tweezers have been an excellent platform for studying stochastic thermodynamics. In this context, this work presents experimental measurements of the energetic cost of driven finite-time protocols using colloidal Brownian particles in harmonic potentials. For this simple model system, we compare the results of optimal and sub-optimal protocols in a time-dependent trap, controlling the trap stiffness with different modulation amplitudes and protocol times. We also calculate the Jarzynski relation for the stochastic trajectories from the experimental data as an independent consistency check.