Quantum Engine Combines Power with Ideal Efficiency ⚡ экспресс
Ordinary heat engines can't be both powerful and achieve the ideal Carnot efficiency—it's like trying to drive fast without using any fuel at all. In the quantum world, collective effects make it possible to bypass this limitation. Researchers have proposed a real scheme using superconducting circuits that gets close to maximum efficiency without losing power. Could this be the key to future energy wonders?
Ordinary engines suffer from an irreconcilable conflict: the higher the power, the more the efficiency drops. The reason is energy dissipation, which physicists call an increase in entropy—a measure of disorder.
Quantum laws offer a workaround. When many microscopic systems, like superconducting circuits, work not separately but as a single ensemble, collective amplification emerges. It’s like the synchronized flashing of fireflies: each individual acts in unison with the others, producing a bright flash without extra noise. Here too, quantum elements, coherently switching states, deliver clean energy.
Theoretically, such an engine almost reaches the ideal calculated by Ludwig Boltzmann for the Carnot cycle. The principle is similar to the operation of a laser, discovered by Max Planck: many atoms emit photons synchronously. In the proposed device, transitions between states in superconducting structures are synchronized—the discovery of which earned John Bardeen a Nobel Prize. The process is controlled using highly precise photometry (measurement of light). This erases the classical trade-off, promising future engines—powerful and almost lossless.
🎯 In household appliances, up to 60–70% of energy is lost as heat due to friction. In quantum systems, this friction vanishes: instead, collective amplification kicks in, allowing close to 100% of the theoretically possible efficiency. Such an engine could run almost loss-free.