Work distribution in thermal processes.

Abstract

We find the moment generating function (mgf) of the nonequilibrium work for open systems undergoing a thermal process, i.e., when the stochastic dynamics maps thermal states into time-dependent thermal states. The mgf is given in terms of a temperaturelike scalar satisfying a first-order ordinary differential equation. We apply the result to some paradigmatic situations: a levitated nanoparticle in a breathing optical trap, a Brownian particle in a box with a moving piston, and a two-state system driven by an external field, where the work mgfs are obtained for different timescales and compared with Monte Carlo simulations.