Multilayer Graphene as an Endoreversible Otto Engine

Abstract

Graphene is perhaps the most prominent "Dirac material," a class of systems whose electronic structure gives rise to charge carriers that behave as relativistic fermions. In multilayer graphene several crystal sheets are stacked such that the honeycomb lattice of each layer is displaced along one of the lattice edges. When subject to an external magnetic field, the scaling of the multilayer energy spectrum with the magnetic field, and thus the system's thermodynamic behavior, depends strongly on the number of layers. With this in mind, we examine the performance of a finite-time endoreversible Otto cycle with multilayer graphene as its working medium. We show that there exists a simple relationship between the engine efficiency and the number of layers, and that the efficiency at maximum power can exceed that of a classical endoreversible Otto cycle.