Heat as a witness of quantum properties

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel heat-based method for detecting quantum resources like entanglement and coherence, leveraging energy constraints and heat exchange with a thermal environment, providing an alternative to traditional measurement techniques.

Contribution

It proposes a new heat-based witness for quantum properties that relies solely on fixed energy measurements, inspired by Maxwell's demon and quantum memory assistance.

Findings

Successfully detects entanglement in isotropic states

Identifies coherence in two-spin systems interacting with a field

Establishes fundamental energy constraints for quantum heat exchange

Abstract

We present a new approach for witnessing quantum resources, such as entanglement and coherence, based on heat generation. Inspired by Maxwell's demon, we ask what the optimal heat exchange between a quantum system and a thermal environment is when the process is assisted by a quantum memory. We derive fundamental energy constraints in this scenario and show that quantum states can reveal non-classical signatures via heat exchange. This approach leads to a heat-based witness for quantum properties, offering an alternative to system-specific measurements, as it only relies on fixed energy measurements in a thermal ancilla. We illustrate our findings with the detection of entanglement in isotropic states and coherence in two-spin systems interacting with a single-mode electromagnetic field.