Almost exactly 200 years ago, French physicist Sadi Carnot determined the maximum efficiency of heat engines. The Carnot ...

This is a preview. Log in through your library . Abstract The thermodynamic and thermophysical properties of liquids suggest that they should be powerful working fluids in heat engines. Their use ...

“We’ve developed the world’s smallest steam engine, or to be more precise the smallest Stirling engine, and found that the machine really does perform work,” said Clemens Bechinger, a physicist at the ...

For two centuries, students have learned that heat flows and engines work according to rigid limits that no machine can beat.

Quantum thermodynamics explores the fundamental principles governing energy conversion at the smallest scales, where quantum effects such as coherence and entanglement significantly influence the ...

A technology which works on a large scale can cause unexpected problems on a small one. And these can be of a fundamental nature. This is because different laws prevail in the micro- and the ...

Ever since the invention of water mills in antiquity, through the development of the steam engine in the 18th century, and up to today’s turbines, many power generators rely on the principle of ...

In and out: An illustration of the quantum engine as a piston, showing the piston compressed when the particles in the gas exist as bosonic molecules and expanded when they are individual fermionic ...

Tabletop experiments by Indian physicists have broken a barrier proposed 200 years ago by a legendary French engineer, Sadi Carnot, raising hopes of new high-efficiency heat engines hitherto ...