We consider a finite one-dimensional chain of quantum rotors interacting with a set of thermal baths at different temperatures.When the interaction between the rotors is made chiral, such Water Jug Lid Cap a system behaves as an autonomous thermal motor, converting heat currents into nonvanishing rotational ones.Such a dynamical response is strongly pronounced in the range of the Hamiltonian parameters for which the ground state of the system in the thermodynamic limit exhibits a quantum phase transition.Such working points are associated with large quantum coherence and multipartite quantum correlations within the state of the system.
This suggests that the optimal operating regime of such a quantum autonomous motor is Bow one of maximal quantumness.