A Monte Carlo study of Maxwell’s demon coupled to finite quantum heat baths
Author
Güler, Umutcan
Advisor
Yalabık, Cemal
Date
2020-09Publisher
Bilkent University
Language
English
Type
ThesisItem Usage Stats
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Abstract
When Maxwell’s demon was introduced, it raised the question: Is there a way to
decrease an isolated system’s entropy, even though it was forbidden by the second law of thermodynamics. Then, a new idea which considered information as a physical entity was emerged, and an equivalence between information entropy and
thermodynamic entropy was suggested. Under the light of new understandings,
the original question modified into "Is there a way to decrease thermodynamic
entropy of a system by using information entropy?" This work aims to demonstrate such a machinery is possible to exist in real world. Building on the model
of Mandal et al. [1], it inquires whether if such a system is possible to build in
nano scales. According to the theoretical relations, the correspondences between
internal energy and effective temperature of finite fermionic and bosonic gases
for varying number of particles and volumes were tabulated. Subsequently, a
series of Monte Carlo simulations were executed under different circumstances.
The outcomes of the simulations illustrate that production of information entropy
can be used to compensate the decrease of thermodynamic entropy. The results
indicate that using either one of the quantum gases as a finite quantum heat bath
does affect the efficiency of the refrigerator. Based on this, using fermionic gas
is superior to bosonic gas in terms of swiftness of the refrigeration, if all other
variables are identical. Further research is needed to analyze the behaviour of the
finite quantum heat baths at extremely low temperatures.
Keywords
Maxwell’s DemonInformation entropy
Finite fermi gas
Finite bose gas
Monte Carlo simulation