Steady state entanglement beyond thermal limits

Abstract

Classical engines turn thermal resources into work, which is maximized for reversible operations. The quantum realm has expanded the range of useful operations beyond energy conversion, and incoherent resources beyond thermal reservoirs. This is the case of entanglement generation in a driven-dissipative protocol, which we hereby analyze as a continuous quantum machine. We show that for such machines the more irreversible the process the larger the concurrence. Maximal concurrence and entropy production are reached for the hot reservoir being at negative effective temperature, beating the limits set by classic thermal operations on an equivalent system.