Information-theoretic foundations of thermodynamics in general probabilistic theories

Understand

We study the informational underpinnings of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics, using an abstract framework, general probabilistic theories, capable of describing arbitrary physical theories.

• This allows one to abstract the informational content of a theory from the concrete details of its formalism.
• In this framework, we extend the treatment of microcanonical thermodynamics, namely the thermodynamics of systems with a well-defined energy, beyond the known cases of classical and quantum theory, formulating two necessary requirements for a well-defined thermodynamics.
• We adopt the recent approach of resource theories, where one studies the transitions between states that can be accomplished with a restricted set of physical operations.