Almost exactly 200 years ago, French physicist Sadi Carnot determined the maximum efficiency of heat engines. The Carnot principle, the second law of thermodynamics, was developed for large, ...

For two centuries, students have learned that heat flows and engines work according to rigid limits that no machine can beat.

Physicists have designed a novel micro heat engine that can produce maximum power at maximum efficiency 1. The engine operates with a single particle whose width is one hundredth of a single human ...