Landauer Principle and the Second Law in a Relativistic Communication Scenario

Abstract

The problem of formulating thermodynamics in a relativistic scenario remains unresolved, although many proposals exist in the literature. The challenge arises due to the intrinsic dynamic structure of spacetime as established by the general theory of relativity. With the discovery of the physical nature of information, which underpins Landauer’s principle, we believe that information theory should play a role in understanding this problem. In this work, we contribute to this endeavour by considering a relativistic communication task between two partners, Alice and Bob, in a general Lorentzian spacetime. We then assume that the receiver, Bob, reversibly operates a local heat engine powered by information, and seek to determine the maximum amount of work he can extract from this device. As Bob cannot extract work for free, by applying both Landauer’s principle and the second law of thermodynamics, we establish a bound on the energy Bob must spend to acquire the information in the first place. This bound is a function of the spacetime metric and the properties of the communication channel.