title: Power enhancement of heat engines via correlated thermalization in a three-level "working fluid".
abstract: We explore means of maximizing the power output of a heat engine based on a periodically-driven quantum system that is constantly coupled to hot and cold baths. It is shown that the maximal power output of such a heat engine whose "working fluid" is a degenerate V-type three-level system is that generated by two independent two-level systems. Hence, level degeneracy is a thermodynamic resource that may effectively double the power output. The efficiency, however, is not affected. We find that coherence is not an essential asset in such multilevel-based heat engines. The existence of two thermalization pathways sharing a common ground state suffices for power enhancement.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.|Department of Chemical Physics, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 7610001, Israel.
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Gelbwaser-Klimovsky
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical Physics, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 7610001, Israel.
authors.forename: Wolfgang
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Niedenzu
authors.affiliation: Chemical Physics Theory Group, Department of Chemistry and Centre for Quantum Information and Quantum Control, University of Toronto, Ontario M5S 3H6, Canada.
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Brumer
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical Physics, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 7610001, Israel.
authors.forename: Gershon
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Kurizki