Surface-catalyzed liquid-liquid phase separation and amyloid-like assembly in microscale compartments.

Liquid-liquid phase separation is a key phenomenon in the formation of membrane-less structures within the cell, appearing as liquid biomolecular condensates. Protein condensates are the most studied for their biological relevance, and their tendency to evolve, resulting in the formation of aggregates with a high level of order called amyloid. In this study, it is demonstrated that Human Insulin forms micrometric, round amyloid-like structures at room temperature within sub-microliter scale aqueous compartments.

Quantum correlations beyond entanglement in a classical-channel model of gravity.

A direct quantization of the Newtonian interaction between two masses is known to establish entanglement, which if detected would witness the quantum nature of the gravitational field. Gravitational interaction is yet compatible also with gravitational decoherence models relying on classical channels, hence unable to create entanglement. Here, we show in paradigmatic cases that, despite the absence of entanglement, a classical-channel model of gravity can still establish quantum correlations in the form of quantum discord between two masses.

Synchronizing Two Superconducting Qubits through a Dissipating Resonator.

A system consisting of two qubits and a resonator is considered in the presence of different sources of noise, bringing to light the possibility of making the two qubits evolve in a synchronized way. A direct qubit-qubit interaction turns out to be a crucial ingredient, as well as the dissipation processes involving the resonator. The detrimental role of the local dephasing of the qubits is also taken into account.

Evanescent Wave Approximation for Non-Hermitian Hamiltonians.

The counterpart of the rotating wave approximation for non-Hermitian Hamiltonians is considered, which allows for the derivation of a suitable effective Hamiltonian for systems with some states undergoing decay. In the limit of very high decay rates, on the basis of this effective description we can predict the occurrence of a quantum Zeno dynamics, which is interpreted as the removal of some coupling terms and the vanishing of an operatorial pseudo-Lamb shift.

Simple scheme for extracting work with a single bath.

We propose a simple protocol exploiting the thermalization of a storage bipartite system S to extract work from a resource system R. The protocol is based on a recent work definition involving only a single bath. A general description of the protocol is provided without specifying the characteristics of S.

Steepest entropy ascent for two-state systems with slowly varying Hamiltonians.

The steepest entropy ascent approach is considered and applied to two-state systems. When the Hamiltonian of the system is time-dependent, the principle of maximum entropy production can still be exploited; arguments to support this fact are given. In the limit of slowly varying Hamiltonians, which allows for the adiabatic approximation for the unitary part of the dynamics, the system exhibits significant robustness to the thermalization process.