Nonequilibrium potential and fluctuation theorems for quantum maps

• DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.92.032129
• ArXiv number: 1505.04201

We derive a general fluctuation theorem for quantum maps. The theorem applies to a broad class of quantum dynamics, such as unitary evolution, decoherence, thermalization, and other types of evolution for quantum open systems. The theorem reproduces well-known fluctuation theorems in a single and simplified framework and extends the Hatano-Sasa theorem to quantum nonequilibrium processes. Moreover, it helps to elucidate the physical nature of the environment that induces a given dynamics in an open quantum system.

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