(Phys.org) —In 2012, a team of physicists from Germany proposed a scheme for realizing a nanoscale heat engine composed of a single ion. Like a macroscale heat engine, the theoretical nanoscale version can convert heat into mechanical work by taking advantage of the temperature difference between two thermal reservoirs. Because the single-ion heat engine is so small, at the time the physicists noted that it had the potential to tap into the quantum regime and experience quantum effects.
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