Entropy of the quantum work distribution

Abstract

The statistics of work done on a quantum system can be quantified by the two-point measurement scheme. We show how the Shannon entropy of the work distribution admits a general upper bound depending on the initial diagonal entropy, and a purely quantum term associated to the relative entropy of coherence. We demonstrate that this approach captures strong signatures of the underlying physics in a diverse range of settings. In particular, we carry out a detailed study of the Aubry-André-Harper model and show that the entropy of the work distribution conveys very clearly the physics of the localization transition, which is not apparent from the statistical moments.

Publication
Physical Review Research 5, L022010