Self-Consistent Microscopic Model of Fluctuation-Induced Transport

TL;DR

This paper develops a microscopic Hamiltonian model of an information engine that extracts work from a thermal bath using a nonequilibrium bath, linking microscopic thermodynamics to engine kinetics.

Contribution

It introduces a self-consistent microscopic model of a Maxwell's demon type engine incorporating nonequilibrium baths and relates its kinetics to thermodynamics.

Findings

Engine kinetics depend on the nonequilibrium bath state.

The model establishes a connection between microscopic thermodynamics and information-driven work extraction.

Self-consistent calculations demonstrate the engine's operation from fundamental principles.

Abstract

A Maxwell's demon type ``information engine" which extracts work from a bath is constructed from a microscopic Hamiltonian for the whole system including a subsystem, a thermal bath, and a nonequilibrium bath of phonons or photons which represents an information source/sink. The kinetics of the engine is calculated self-consistently from the state of the nonequilibrium bath, and the relation of this kinetics to the underlying microscopic thermodynamics is established.