title: Most energetic passive states.
abstract: Passive states are defined as those states that do not allow for work extraction in a cyclic (unitary) process. Within the set of passive states, thermal states are the most stable ones: they maximize the entropy for a given energy, and similarly they minimize the energy for a given entropy. Here we find the passive states lying in the other extreme, i.e., those that maximize the energy for a given entropy, which we show also minimize the entropy when the energy is fixed. These extremal properties make these states useful to obtain fundamental bounds for the thermodynamics of finite-dimensional quantum systems, which we show in several scenarios.
authors.affiliation: ICFO-Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques, Mediterranean Technology Park, 08860 Castelldefels (Barcelona), Spain.
authors.forename: Martí
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Perarnau-Llobet
authors.affiliation: ICFO-Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques, Mediterranean Technology Park, 08860 Castelldefels (Barcelona), Spain.
authors.forename: Karen V
authors.initials: KV
authors.lastname: Hovhannisyan
authors.affiliation: ICFO-Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques, Mediterranean Technology Park, 08860 Castelldefels (Barcelona), Spain.|Departament de Física, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, E-08193 Bellaterra, Spain.
authors.forename: Marcus
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Huber
authors.affiliation: ICFO-Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques, Mediterranean Technology Park, 08860 Castelldefels (Barcelona), Spain.|H. H. Wills Physics Laboratory, University of Bristol, Tyndall Avenue, Bristol, BS8 1TL, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Skrzypczyk
authors.affiliation: ICFO-Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques, Mediterranean Technology Park, 08860 Castelldefels (Barcelona), Spain.
authors.forename: Jordi
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Tura
authors.affiliation: ICFO-Institut de Ciencies Fotoniques, Mediterranean Technology Park, 08860 Castelldefels (Barcelona), Spain.|ICREA-Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats, Lluis Companys 23, 08010 Barcelona, Spain.
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Acín