Internal temperature of quantum chaotic systems at the nanoscale

Jiaozi Wang, Wen-ge Wang
2017 Physical review. E  
The extent to which a temperature can be appropriately assigned to a small quantum system, as an internal property but not as a property of any large environment, is still an open problem. In this paper, a method is proposed for solving this problem, by which a studied system is coupled to a two-level system (probe) as a microscopic thermometer. For small quantum chaotic systems, we show that a temperature can be determined, the value of which is sensitive to neither the form, location, and
more » ... ngth of the probe-system coupling, nor the Hamiltonian and initial state of the probe. This temperature turns out to have the form of Boltzmann temperature.
doi:10.1103/physreve.96.032207 pmid:29346933 fatcat:d4hyhdw2nrh4bbzm7gigjiikby