2003/02/10 by Shaul Mukamel, Mukamel, Shaul
Physics and Astronomy · #Advanced Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics #Quantum Mechanics and Applications #Spectroscopy and Quantum Chemical Studies #cond-mat.soft #cond-mat.stat-mech
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.cond-mat/0302190
arxiv created 2003/04/22 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30
The relation between the distribution of work performed on a classical system by an external force switched on an arbitrary timescale, and the corresponding equilibrium free energy difference, is generalized to quantum systems. Using the adiabatic representation we show that this relation holds for isolated systems as well as for systems coupled to a bath described by a master equation. A close formal analogy is established between the present classical trajectory picture over populations of adiabatic states and phase fluctuations (dephasing) of a quantum coherence in spectral lineshapes, described by the stochastic Liouville equation.