title: Quantum-classical transition of photon-Carnot engine induced by quantum decoherence.
abstract: We study the physical implementation of the photon-Carnot engine (PCE) based on the cavity quantum electrodynamics system [M. O. Scully, M. Suhail Zubairy, G. S. Agarwal, and H. Walther, Science 299, 862 (2003)]. Here we analyze two decoherence mechanisms for the more practical systems of PCE, the dissipation of photon field, and the pure dephasing of the input atoms. As a result we find that (i) the PCE can work well to some extent even in the existence of the cavity loss (photon dissipation) and (ii) the short-time atomic dephasing, which can destroy the PCE, is a fatal problem to be overcome.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Theoretical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100080, China.
authors.forename: H T
authors.initials: HT
authors.lastname: Quan
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: C P
authors.initials: CP
authors.lastname: Sun