Thermodynamic control of non-equilibrium systems

TL;DR

This paper develops a framework combining linear response and Lagrangian methods to analyze and optimize the thermodynamic costs of transitioning between non-equilibrium steady states, revealing key properties of optimal protocols.

Contribution

It introduces a novel approach to minimize dissipation in non-equilibrium systems using combined linear-response and Lagrangian techniques.

Findings

Optimal protocols exhibit diverging parameters.

Finite entropy production occurs in slow-driving limits.

Framework applied successfully to a simple toy model.

Abstract

We study the thermodynamic cost associated with driving systems between different non-equilibrium steady states. In particular, we combine a linear-response framework for non-equilibrium Markov systems with Lagrangian techniques to minimize the dissipation associated with driving processes. We then apply our framework to a simple toy model. Our results show several remarkable properties for the optimal protocol, such as diverging parameters and finite entropy production in the slow-driving limit.