Abstract Many of the quantities that matter in quantum technology, e.g. entropy, entanglement, etc., cannot be associated with operator observables, because they depend non-linearly on the quantum state’s density matrix. The non-linearity provokes another bigger issue: Standard open-system equations evolve just one copy of that matrix, so we cannot track how such elusive quantities change. A recent formalism by Ansari and Nazarov sidestepped this by evolving multiple virtual replicas at once, but only in the weak-coupling regime. Here, we remove that limitation. Our generalized, multi-replicative master equation follows entropy flow and other vital metrics even when a quantum device interacts strongly with a classical environment. We show quantum coherence and hybridization jointly act to inhibit the net transfer of entropy, effectively introducing a “bottleneck” in the thermodynamic process. This sharper view of quantum–classical hybridization points the way toward more robust, resource-aware quantum hardware.
Rapp et al. (Mon,) studied this question.
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