Designing a heat engine capable of producing maximum power while maintaining maximum efficiency has long been a significant challenge in physics and engineering. Practical heat engines are constrained by a theoretical limit to their efficiency, known as the Carnot limit, which sets a cap on how much heat can be converted to useful work.
Optical tweezer apparatus in Ajay Sood’s lab at IISc. Inset : Sudeesh Krishnamurthy, Rajesh Ganapathy, and Ajay Sood. Credit: Sudeesh Krishnamurthy In the current study, the team mimicked the functioning of a conventional heat engine at the micron scale. Instead of using a mix of gas and fuel, they took a tiny gel-like colloidal bead and used a laser beam to direct its motion, similar to how the piston works in a macroscopic engine.
“What we have achieved is a reduction in heat distribution time through the introduction of the electric field. This reduction in heat distribution time allows the engine to operate at high efficiency and simultaneously yield a large power output even while operating at high speeds,” says Krishnamurthy.Previously, the team designed a high-power engine that used a live bacterium to push the particle and power the system.