Classical and quantum thermodynamics described as a system-bath model: The dimensionless minimum work principle.

We formulate a thermodynamic theory applicable to both classical and quantum systems. These systems are depicted as thermodynamic system-bath models capable of handling isothermal, isentropic, thermostatic, and entropic processes. Our approach is based on the use of a dimensionless thermodynamic potential expressed as a function of the intensive and extensive thermodynamic variables. Using the principles of dimensionless minimum work and dimensionless maximum entropy derived from quasi-static changes of external perturbations and temperature, we obtain the Massieu-Planck potentials as entropic potentials and the Helmholtz-Gibbs potentials as free energy. These potentials can be interconverted through time-dependent Legendre transformations. Our results are verified numerically for an anharmonic Brownian system described in phase space using the low-temperature quantum Fokker-Planck equations in the quantum case and the Kramers equation in the classical case, both developed for the thermodynamic system-bath model. Thus, we clarify the conditions for thermodynamics to be valid even for small systems described by Hamiltonians and establish a basis for extending thermodynamics to non-equilibrium conditions.

Coherent two-dimensional THz magnetic resonance spectroscopies for molecular magnets: Analysis of Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction.

To investigate the novel quantum dynamic behaviors of magnetic materials that arise from complex spin-spin interactions, it is necessary to probe the magnetic response at a speed greater than the spin-relaxation and dephasing processes. Recently developed two-dimensional (2D) terahertz magnetic resonance (THz-MR) spectroscopy techniques use the magnetic components of laser pulses, and this allows investigation of the details of the ultrafast dynamics of spin systems. For such investigations, quantum treatment-not only of the spin system itself but also of the environment surrounding the spin system-is important. In our method, based on the theory of multidimensional optical spectroscopy, we formulate nonlinear THz-MR spectra using an approach based on the numerically rigorous hierarchical equations of motion. We conduct numerical calculations of both linear (1D) and 2D THz-MR spectra for a linear chiral spin chain. The pitch and direction of chirality (clockwise or anticlockwise) are determined by the strength and sign of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI). We show that not only the strength but also the sign of the DMI can be evaluated through the use of 2D THz-MR spectroscopic measurements, while 1D measurements allow us to determine only the strength.

Simulating two-dimensional correlation spectroscopies with third-order infrared and fifth-order infrared-Raman processes of liquid water.

To investigate the possibility of measuring the intermolecular and intramolecular anharmonic coupling of balk water, we calculate third-order two-dimensional (2D) infrared spectra and fifth-order 2D IR-IR-Raman-Raman spectra expressed in terms of four-body correlation functions of optical observables. For this purpose, a multimode Brownian oscillator model of four interacting anharmonic oscillators strongly coupled to their respective heat baths is employed. The nonlinearity of system-bath interactions is considered to describe thermal relaxation and vibrational dephasing. The linear and nonlinear spectra are then computed in a non-Markovian and nonperturbative regime in a rigorous manner using discretized hierarchical equations of motion in mixed Liouville-Wigner space. The calculated 2D spectra for stretching-bending, bending-librational, stretching-librational, and stretching-translational modes consist of various positive and negative peaks exhibiting essential details of intermolecular and intramolecular mode-mode interactions under thermal relaxation and dephasing at finite temperature.

Discretized hierarchical equations of motion in mixed Liouville-Wigner space for two-dimensional vibrational spectroscopies of liquid water.

A model of a bulk water system describing the vibrational motion of intramolecular and intermolecular modes is constructed, enabling analysis of its linear and nonlinear vibrational spectra as well as the energy transfer processes between the vibrational modes. The model is described as a system of four interacting anharmonic oscillators nonlinearly coupled to their respective heat baths. To perform a rigorous numerical investigation of the non-Markovian and nonperturbative quantum dissipative dynamics of the model, we derive discretized hierarchical equations of motion in mixed Liouville-Wigner space, with Lagrange-Hermite mesh discretization being employed in the Liouville space of the intramolecular modes and Lagrange-Hermite mesh discretization and Hermite discretization in the Wigner space of the intermolecular modes. One-dimensional infrared and Raman spectra and two-dimensional terahertz-infrared-visible and infrared-infrared-Raman spectra are computed as demonstrations of the quantum dissipative description provided by our model.

Effect of mixed Frenkel and charge transfer states in time-gated fluorescence spectra of perylene bisimides H-aggregates: Hierarchical equations of motion approach.

We theoretically investigated the effect of mixed Frenkel (F) and charge transfer (CT) states on the spectral properties of perylene bisimide (PBI) derivatives, focusing on the role of strong electron-phonon interactions. The model consists of a four-level system described by the Holstein Hamiltonian coupled to independent local heat-baths on each site, described by Brownian spectral distribution functions. We employ the reduced hierarchical equations of motion (HEOM) approach to calculate the time evolution of the system and compare it to the pure F exciton cases. We compute the absorption and time-gated fluorescence (TGF) spectra for different exciton transfer integrals and F-CT bandgap conditions. The coherence length of excitons (Ncoh) is evaluated employing two different definitions. We observe the presence of an excited hot state peak whose intensity is associated with the delocalization of the excited species and ultrafast dynamics that are solely dependent on the frequency of the local bath. The results indicate that the inclusion of CT states promotes localization of the excitons, which is manifested in a decrease in the intensity of the hot state peak and the 0-1 peak and an increase in the intensity of the 0-0 emission peak in the TGF spectrum, leading to a decrease of Ncoh.

Numerically "exact" simulations of a quantum Carnot cycle: Analysis using thermodynamic work diagrams.

We investigate the efficiency of a quantum Carnot engine based on open quantum dynamics theory. The model includes time-dependent external fields for the subsystems controlling the isothermal and isentropic processes and for the system-bath (SB) interactions controlling the transition between these processes. Numerical simulations are conducted in a nonperturbative and non-Markovian SB coupling regime by using the hierarchical equations of motion under these fields at different cycle frequencies. The work applied to the total system and the heat exchanged with the baths are rigorously evaluated. In addition, by regarding quasi-static work as free energy, we compute the quantum thermodynamic variables and analyze the simulation results by using thermodynamic work diagrams for the first time. Analysis of these diagrams indicates that, in the strong SB coupling region, the fields for the SB interactions are major sources of work, while in other regions, the field for the subsystem is a source of work. We find that the maximum efficiency is achieved in the quasi-static case and is determined solely by the bath temperatures, regardless of the SB coupling strength, which is a numerical manifestation of Carnot's theorem.

The laws of thermodynamics for quantum dissipative systems: A quasi-equilibrium Helmholtz energy approach.

By using the quasi-equilibrium Helmholtz energy, which is defined as the thermodynamic work in a quasi-static process, we investigate the thermal properties of both an isothermal process and a transition process between the adiabatic and isothermal states (adiabatic transition). Here, the work is defined by the change in energy from a steady state to another state under a time-dependent perturbation. In particular, the work for a quasi-static change is regarded as thermodynamic work. We employ a system-bath model that involves time-dependent perturbations in both the system and the system-bath interaction. We conduct numerical experiments for a three-stroke heat machine (a Kelvin-Planck cycle). For this purpose, we employ the hierarchical equations of motion (HEOM) approach. These experiments involve an adiabatic transition field that describes the operation of an adiabatic wall between the system and the bath. Thermodynamic-work diagrams for external fields and their conjugate variables, similar to the P-V diagram, are introduced to analyze the work done for the system in the cycle. We find that the thermodynamic efficiency of this machine is zero because the field for the isothermal processes acts as a refrigerator, whereas that for the adiabatic wall acts as a heat engine. This is a numerical manifestation of the Kelvin-Planck statement, which states that it is impossible to derive the mechanical effects from a single heat source. These HEOM simulations serve as a rigorous test of thermodynamic formulations because the second law of thermodynamics is only valid when the work involved in the operation of the adiabatic wall is treated accurately.

Imaginary-time hierarchical equations of motion for thermodynamic variables.

The partition function (PF) plays a key role in the calculation of quantum thermodynamic properties of a system that interacts with a heat bath. The imaginary-time hierarchical equations of motion (imHEOM) approach was developed to evaluate in a rigorous manner the PF of a system strongly coupled to a non-Markovian bath. In this paper, we present a numerically efficient scheme to evaluate the imHEOM utilizing the ß-differentiated imHEOM (BD-imHEOM) that are obtained by differentiating the elements of the imHEOM with respect to the inverse temperature. This approach allows us to evaluate the system, system-bath interaction, and heat-bath parts of the PF efficiently. Moreover, we employ a polyharmonic decomposition method to construct a concise hierarchical structure with better convergence, thus reducing the cost of numerical integrations. We demonstrate the proposed approach by compute thermodynamic quantities of a spin-boson system and a 2 × 2 antiferromagnetic triangular spin lattice system with an Ohmic spectral distribution.

Optical response of laser-driven charge-transfer complex described by Holstein-Hubbard model coupled to heat baths: Hierarchical equations of motion approach.

We investigate the optical response of a charge-transfer complex in a condensed phase driven by an external laser field. Our model includes an instantaneous short-range Coulomb interaction and a local optical vibrational mode described by the Holstein-Hubbard (HH) model. Although characterization of the HH model for a bulk system has typically been conducted using a complex phase diagram, this approach is not sufficient for investigations of dynamical behavior at finite temperature, in particular for studies of nonlinear optical properties, where the time irreversibility of the dynamics that arises from the environment becomes significant. We therefore include heat baths with infinite heat capacity in the model to introduce thermal effects characterized by fluctuation and dissipation to the system dynamics. By reducing the number of degrees of freedom of the heat baths, we derive numerically "exact" hierarchical equations of motion for the reduced density matrix of the HH system. As demonstrations, we calculate the optical response of the system in two- and four-site cases under external electric fields. The results indicate that the effective strength of the system-bath coupling becomes large as the number of sites increases. Excitation of electrons promotes the conductivity when the Coulomb repulsion is equivalent to or dominates the electron-phonon coupling, whereas excitation of optical vibrations always suppresses the conductivity.

Modeling and Simulating the Excited-State Dynamics of a System with Condensed Phases: A Machine Learning Approach.

Simulating the irreversible quantum dynamics of exciton- and electron-transfer problems poses a nontrivial challenge. Because the irreversibility of the system dynamics is a result of quantum thermal activation and dissipation caused by the surrounding environment, it is necessary to include infinite environmental degrees of freedom in the simulation. Because the capabilities of full quantum dynamics simulations that include the surrounding molecular degrees of freedom are limited, employing a system-bath model is a practical approach. In such a model, the dynamics of excitons or electrons are described by a system Hamiltonian, while the other degrees of freedom that arise from the environmental molecules are described by a harmonic oscillator bath (HOB) and system-bath interaction parameters. By extending on a previous study of molecular liquids [ J. Chem. Theory Comput. 2020, 16, 2099], here, we construct a system-bath model for exciton- and electron-transfer problems by means of a machine learning approach. We determine both the system and system-bath interaction parameters, including the spectral distribution of the bath, using the electronic excitation energies obtained from a quantum mechanics/molecular mechanics (QM/MM) simulation that is conducted as a function of time. Using the analytical expressions of optical response functions, we calculate linear and two-dimensional electronic spectra (2DES) for indocarbocyanine dimers in methanol. From these results, we demonstrate the capability of our approach to elucidate the nonequilibrium exciton dynamics of a quantum system in a nonintuitive manner.

Probing photoinduced proton coupled electron transfer process by means of two-dimensional resonant electronic-vibrational spectroscopy.

We develop a detailed theoretical model of photo-induced proton-coupled electron transfer (PPCET) processes, which are at the basis of solar energy harvesting in biological systems and photovoltaic materials. Our model enables us to analyze the dynamics and the efficiency of a PPCET reaction under the influence of a thermal environment by disentangling the contribution of the fundamental electron transfer and proton transfer steps. In order to study quantum dynamics of the PPCET process under an interaction with the non-Markovian environment, we employ the hierarchical equations of motion. We calculate transient absorption spectroscopy (TAS) and a newly defined two-dimensional resonant electronic-vibrational spectroscopy (2DREVS) signals in order to study the nonequilibrium reaction dynamics. Our results show that different transition pathways can be separated by TAS and 2DREVS.

Full molecular dynamics simulations of molecular liquids for single-beam spectrally controlled two-dimensional Raman spectroscopy.

Single-beam spectrally controlled (SBSC) two-dimensional (2D) Raman spectroscopy is a unique 2D vibrational measurement technique utilizing trains of short pulses that are generated from a single broadband pulse by pulse shaping. This approach overcomes the difficulty of 2D Raman spectroscopy in dealing with small-signal extraction and avoids complicated low-order cascading effects, thus providing a new possibility for measuring the intramolecular and intermolecular modes of molecular liquids using fifth-order 2D Raman spectroscopy. Recently, for quantitatively investigating the mode-mode coupling mechanism, Hurwitz et al. [Opt. Express 28, 3803 (2020)] have developed a new pulse design for this measurement to separate the contributions of the fifth- and third-order polarizations, which are often overlapped in the original single-beam measurements. Here, we describe a method for simulating these original measurements and the new 2D Raman measurements on the basis of a second-order response function approach. We carry out full molecular dynamics simulations for carbon tetrachloride and liquid water using an equilibrium-nonequilibrium hybrid algorithm, with the aim of explaining the key features of the SBSC 2D Raman spectroscopic method from a theoretical point of view. The predicted signal profiles and intensities provide valuable information that can be applied to 2D spectroscopy experiments, allowing them to be carried out more efficiently.

Exciton transfer in organic photovoltaic cells: A role of local and nonlocal electron-phonon interactions in a donor domain.

We theoretically investigate an exciton transfer process in a donor domain of organic photovoltaic cells focusing on the roles of local and nonlocal electron-phonon interactions. Our model consists of a three-level system described by the Holstein-Peierls Hamiltonian coupled to multiple heat baths for local and nonlocal molecular modes characterized by Brownian spectral distribution functions. We chose tetracene as a reference donor molecule, where the spectral distribution functions of the local and nonlocal modes are available. We then employ the reduced hierarchical equations of motion approach to simulate the dynamics of the system under the influence of the environment as a function of the electron-phonon coupling strength and temperature. We rigorously calculate the reduced density matrix elements to explain the time scale of dynamics under the influence of the dissipative local and nonlocal modes. The results indicate that the strong nonlocal electron-phonon interaction under high temperature conditions favors the exciton transfer process and enhances the efficiency of organic photovoltaic materials, while the lifetime of the exciton becomes shorter due to a low-frequency local mode.

Open quantum dynamics theory for a complex subenvironment system with a quantum thermostat: Application to a spin heat bath.

Complex environments, such as molecular matrices and biological material, play a fundamental role in many important dynamic processes in condensed phases. Because it is extremely difficult to conduct full quantum dynamics simulations on such environments due to their many degrees of freedom, here, we treat in detail the environment only around the main system of interest (the subenvironment), while the other degrees of freedom needed to maintain the equilibrium temperature are described by a simple harmonic bath, which we call a quantum thermostat. The noise generated by the subenvironment is spatially non-local and non-Gaussian and cannot be characterized by the fluctuation-dissipation theorem. We describe this model by simulating the dynamics of a two-level system (TLS) that interacts with a subenvironment consisting of a one-dimensional XXZ spin chain. The hierarchical Schrödinger equations of motion are employed to describe the quantum thermostat, allowing for time-irreversible simulations of the dynamics at arbitrary temperature. To see the effects of a quantum phase transition of the subenvironment, we investigate the decoherence and relaxation processes of the TLS at zero and finite temperatures for various values of the spin anisotropy. We observed the decoherence of the TLS at finite temperature even when the anisotropy of the XXZ model is enormous. We also found that the population-relaxation dynamics of the TLS changed in a complex manner with the change in the anisotropy and the ferromagnetic or antiferromagnetic orders of spins.

Numerically "exact" simulations of entropy production in the fully quantum regime: Boltzmann entropy vs von Neumann entropy.

We present a scheme to evaluate thermodynamic variables for a system coupled to a heat bath under a time-dependent external force using the quasi-static Helmholtz energy from the numerically "exact" hierarchical equations of motion (HEOM). We computed the entropy produced by a spin system strongly coupled to a non-Markovian heat bath for various temperatures. We showed that when changes to the external perturbation occurred sufficiently slowly, the system always reached thermal equilibrium. Thus, we calculated the Boltzmann entropy and the von Neumann entropy for an isothermal process, as well as various thermodynamic variables, such as changes in internal energies, heat, and work, for a system in quasi-static equilibrium based on the HEOM. We found that although the characteristic features of the system entropies in the Boltzmann and von Neumann cases as a function of the system-bath coupling strength are similar, those for the total entropy production are completely different. The total entropy production in the Boltzmann case is always positive, whereas that in the von Neumann case becomes negative if we chose a thermal equilibrium state of the total system (an unfactorized thermal equilibrium state) as the initial state. This is because the total entropy production in the von Neumann case does not properly take into account the contribution of the entropy from the system-bath interaction. Thus, the Boltzmann entropy must be used to investigate entropy production in the fully quantum regime. Finally, we examined the applicability of the Jarzynski equality.

Numerically "exact" approach to open quantum dynamics: The hierarchical equations of motion (HEOM).

An open quantum system refers to a system that is further coupled to a bath system consisting of surrounding radiation fields, atoms, molecules, or proteins. The bath system is typically modeled by an infinite number of harmonic oscillators. This system-bath model can describe the time-irreversible dynamics through which the system evolves toward a thermal equilibrium state at finite temperature. In nuclear magnetic resonance and atomic spectroscopy, dynamics can be studied easily by using simple quantum master equations under the assumption that the system-bath interaction is weak (perturbative approximation) and the bath fluctuations are very fast (Markovian approximation). However, such approximations cannot be applied in chemical physics and biochemical physics problems, where environmental materials are complex and strongly coupled with environments. The hierarchical equations of motion (HEOM) can describe the numerically "exact" dynamics of a reduced system under nonperturbative and non-Markovian system-bath interactions, which has been verified on the basis of exact analytical solutions (non-Markovian tests) with any desired numerical accuracy. The HEOM theory has been used to treat systems of practical interest, in particular, to account for various linear and nonlinear spectra in molecular and solid state materials, to evaluate charge and exciton transfer rates in biological systems, to simulate resonant tunneling and quantum ratchet processes in nanodevices, and to explore quantum entanglement states in quantum information theories. This article presents an overview of the HEOM theory, focusing on its theoretical background and applications, to help further the development of the study of open quantum dynamics.

Proton tunneling in a two-dimensional potential energy surface with a non-linear system-bath interaction: Thermal suppression of reaction rate.

We consider a proton transfer (PT) system described by a proton transfer reaction (PTR) coordinate and a rate promoting vibrational (RPV) coordinate interacting with a non-Markovian heat bath. While dynamics of PT processes has been widely discussed using two-dimensional potential energy surfaces, the role of the heat bath, in particular, in a realistic form of the system-bath interaction has not been well explored. Previous studies are largely based on a one-dimensional model and linear-linear system-bath interaction. In the present study, we introduce an exponential-linear (EL) system-bath interaction, which is derived from the analysis of a PTR-RPV system in a realistic situation. This interaction mainly causes vibrational dephasing in the PTR mode and population relaxation in the RPV mode. Numerical simulations were carried out using the hierarchical equations of motion approach. We analyze the role of the heat bath interaction in the chemical reaction rate as a function of the system-bath coupling strength at different temperatures and for different values of the bath correlation time. A prominent feature of the present result is that while the reaction rate predicted from classical and quantum Kramers theory increases as the temperature increases, the present EL interaction model exhibits opposite temperature dependence. The Kramers turn-over profile of the reaction rate as a function of the system-bath coupling is also suppressed in the present EL model, turning into a plateau-like curve for larger system-bath interaction strength. Such features arise from the interplay of the vibrational dephasing process in the PTR mode and the population relaxation process in the RPV mode.

Modeling Intermolecular and Intramolecular Modes of Liquid Water Using Multiple Heat Baths: Machine Learning Approach.

The vibrational motion of molecules in dissipative environments, such as solvation and protein molecules, is composed of contributions from both intermolecular and intramolecular modes. The existence of these collective modes introduces difficulty into quantum simulations of chemical and biological processes. In order to describe the complex molecular motion of the environment in a simple manner, we introduce a system-bath model in which the intramolecular modes with anharmonic mode-mode couplings are described by a system Hamiltonian, while the other degrees of freedom, arising from the environmental molecules, are described by a heat bath. Employing a machine-learning-based approach, we determine not only the system parameters of the intramolecular modes but also the spectral distribution of the system-bath coupling to describe the intermolecular modes, using the atomic trajectories obtained from molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The capabilities of the present approach are demonstrated for liquid water using MD trajectories calculated from the SPC/E model and the polarizable water model for intramolecular and intermolecular vibrational spectroscopies (POLI2VS) by determining the system parameters describing the symmetric-stretch, asymmetric-stretch, and bend modes with intramolecular interactions and the bath spectral distribution functions for each intramolecular mode representing the interaction with the intramolecular modes. From these results, we were able to elucidate the energy relaxation pathway between the intramolecular modes and the intermolecular modes in a nonintuitive manner.

Open quantum dynamics of a three-dimensional rotor calculated using a rotationally invariant system-bath Hamiltonian: Linear and two-dimensional rotational spectra.

We consider a rotationally invariant system-bath (RISB) model in three-dimensional space that is described by a linear rigid rotor independently coupled to three harmonic-oscillator baths through functions of the rotor's Euler angles. While this model has been developed to study the dielectric relaxation of a dipolar molecule in solvation as a problem of classical Debye relaxation, here we investigate it as a problem of open quantum dynamics. Specifically, the treatment presented here is carried out as an extension of a previous work [Y. Iwamoto and Y. Tanimura, J. Chem. Phys 149, 084110 (2018)], in which we studied a two-dimensional (2D) RISB model, to a three-dimensional (3D) RISB model. As in the 2D case, due to a difference in the energy discretization of the total Hamiltonian, the dynamics described by the 3D RISB model differ significantly from those described by the rotational Caldeira-Leggett model. To illustrate the characteristic features of the quantum 3D rotor system described by angular momentum and magnetic quantum numbers, we derive a quantum master equation (QME) and hierarchical equations of motion for the 3D RISB model in the high-temperature case. Using the QME, we compute linear and 2D rotational spectra defined by the linear and nonlinear response functions of the rotor dipole, respectively. The quantum transitions between the angular momentum states and magnetic states arising from polarized Stark fields as well as the system-bath interactions can be clearly observed in 2D rotational spectroscopy.