  Explaining the influence of strong coupling in the dynamics of open quantum
systems is one of the most challenging issues in the rapidly growing field of
quantum thermodynamics. By using a particular definition of heat, we develop a
new approach to study thermodynamics in the strong coupling regime, which takes
into account quantum resources as coherence and entanglement. We apply the
method to calculate the time-dependent thermodynamic properties of a system and
an environment interacting via the generalized amplitude-damping channel
(GADC). The results indicate that the transient imbalance between heat
dissipated and heat absorbed that occurs in the process is responsible for the
generation of system-environment entanglement.
