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A Wigner Quasiprobability Distribution of Work
Federico Cerisola1,2,3,4, Franco Mayo1,2, Augusto J Roncaglia1,2
1Departamento de Física, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires C1428EGA, Argentina.
Abstract:
In this article, we introduce a quasiprobability distribution of work that is based on the Wigner function. This proposal rests on the idea that the work conducted on an isolated system can be coherently measured by coupling the system to a quantum measurement apparatus. In this way, a quasiprobability distribution of work can be defined in terms of the Wigner function of the apparatus. This quasidistribution contains the information of the work statistics and also holds a clear operational definition that can be directly measured in a real experiment. Moreover, it is shown that the presence of quantum coherence in the energy eigenbasis is related with the appearance of features related to non-classicality in the Wigner function such as negativity and interference fringes. On the other hand, from this quasiprobability distribution, it is straightforward to obtain the standard two-point measurement probability distribution of work and also the difference in average energy for initial states with coherences.
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