Project Details: 
Programme: SFI  Frontiers for the Future
Proposal ID:  19/FFP/6951
Proposal Title:  Shortcut-Enhanced Quantum Thermodynamics
Principal Investigator:  Andreas Ruschhaupt, UCC
Co-Investigator:  John Goold, TCD

Lay Abstract:
Microelectronic chips are widespread and crucial to modern life. They are hidden everywhere around us in daily-life techniques. However, when technology development is reaching smaller and smaller scales, the particles in these chips will start to behave completely alien to everyday life experience. Then, everything must be described by quantum physics leading to new quantum technologies. We will develop a novel route to overcome current problems with designing quantum technologies. This route consists of the combination of two areas of expertise in Ireland, namely a technique to control quantum systems called “shortcuts to adiabaticity” with the theory of quantum thermodynamics.

Scientific Abstract:
We are currently at the beginning of a second quantum revolution: With technology developments reaching smaller and smaller scales, quantum effects must be taken fully into consideration. Such new quantum technologies are already emerging, e.g., quantum cryptography and quantum simulations for drug design.
Nevertheless, the realization of quantum technologies which is beyond the proof-of-principle state and which fully utilize the potential of quantum mechanics remains a major challenge because of the fragile nature of quantum states. There is a strong need for understanding and controlling many-particle complex systems at the quantum level. The key idea of this project is to combine shortcuts-to-adiabaticy and quantum thermodynamics to design a new route for solving these challenges. The potential for this merging is nearly self-explaining: ideal thermodynamic processes are based on adiabatic processes which give maximal efficiency but unfortunately require infinite operation time; on the other hand, shortcuts-to-adiabaticy are techniques to speed-up adiabatic processes. Having leading expertise in Ireland in both of these research fields naturally motivates to this proposal. The achieved knowledge will be also used to design new energetically efficient quantum technologies.

Research Team:
Andreas Ruschhaupt, UCC, (Principal Investigator) 
John Goold, TCD, (Co-Investigator)
Jing Li, UCC (Postdoc, since January 2021)
Manuel Odelli, UCC (PhD student, starting soon) 
tba, TCD (PhD student, starting soon)