Symmetry-breaking enabled entanglement out of equilibrium

The integration of color centers with solid-state environments has emerged as a promising platform for combining quantum optics and spintronics, introducing novelties such as asymmetric couplings. In this work, we investigate the dissipative dynamics of a two-qubit system coupled to a magnetic bath through a symmetry-breaking interaction. We demonstrate that, such constructions lead to distinct effective temperatures for local and non-local dissipative processes when the bath is pumped out of equilibrium. Under these conditions, the system's steady state deviates from thermal equilibrium therefore not converging to an unentangled Gibbs state. Remarkably, entangled steady states can be engineered within an optimal range of local and non-local temperatures. To illustrate the mechanism, we present examples for both bosonic and fermionic environments.