title: Emergent thermodynamics in a quenched quantum many-body system.
abstract: We study the statistics of the work done, fluctuation relations, and irreversible entropy production in a quantum many-body system subject to the sudden quench of a control parameter. By treating the quench as a thermodynamic transformation we show that the emergence of irreversibility in the nonequilibrium dynamics of closed many-body quantum systems can be accurately characterized. We demonstrate our ideas by considering a transverse quantum Ising model that is taken out of equilibrium by an instantaneous change of the transverse field.
authors.affiliation: Blackett Laboratory, Department of Physics, Imperial College London, London SW7 2AZ, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Dorner
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Goold
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Cormick
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Paternostro
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Vedral