Thermoelectric efficiency of critical quantum junctions

2013/10/09 by Mihail Mintchev, Mintchev, Mihail, Luca Santoni +4 · 1 citation
Materials Science · Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics #Advanced Thermoelectric Materials and Devices #FOS: Physical sciences #Mathematical Physics (math-ph) #Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics (cond-mat.mes-hall) #Quantum Physics (quant-ph) #Quantum and electron transport phenomena #Statistical Mechanics (cond-mat.stat-mech) #cond-mat.mes-hall #cond-mat.stat-mech #math-ph #math.MP #quant-ph

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1310.2392

4.5 pages, 4 figures, 2 references and some clarifying remarks added

openalex publication_date 2013/10/09 · arxiv created 2013/10/30 · arxiv updated 2013/10/31 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

We derive the efficiency at maximal power of a scale-invariant (critical) quantum junction in exact form. Both Fermi and Bose statistics are considered. We show that time-reversal invariance is spontaneously broken. For fermions we implement a new mechanism for efficiency enhancement above the Curzon-Ahlborn bound, based on a shift of the particle energy in each heat reservoir, proportional to its temperature. In this setting fermionic junctions can even reach at maximal power the Carnot efficiency. The bosonic junctions at maximal power turn out to be less efficient then the fermionic ones.

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• Universal Trade-Off Relation between Power and Efficiency for Heat Engines

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