Coherence-enhanced thermodynamic performance in a periodically-driven inelastic heat engine

TL;DR

This paper investigates how quantum coherence enhances the performance of periodically-driven inelastic heat engines, revealing that inelastic processes and geometric effects significantly improve efficiency and output work.

Contribution

It demonstrates the role of quantum coherence and geometric effects in boosting thermodynamic performance of inelastic heat engines, a novel insight in quantum thermodynamics.

Findings

Inelastic quantum heat engines outperform elastic ones in thermodynamic metrics.

Quantum coherence enhances output work and efficiency.

Berry curvature plays a key role in energy conversion performance.

Abstract

Quantum thermodynamics with microscopic inelastic scattering processes has been intensively investigated in recent years. Here, we apply quantum master equation combined with full counting statistics approach to investigate the role of quantum coherence on the periodically-driven inelastic heat engine. We demonstrate that the inelastic quantum heat engine exhibits dramatic advantage of thermodynamic performance compared to their elastic counterpart. Moreover, it is found that inelastic currents, {output work}, and the efficiency can be enhanced by quantum coherence. In particular, the geometric effect proves crucial in achieving maximal values of generated output work and energy conversion efficiency. The Berry curvature boosted by quantum coherence unveils the underlying mechanism of periodically-driven inelastic heat engine. Our findings may provide some insights for further understanding and optimizing periodically-driven heat engines via quantum coherence resource and inelastic scattering processes.