Thermal physics - Table of contents

This is a table of contents for my notes on thermal physics (thermodynamics and statistical mechanics). The posts are arranged in an order that might be found in a textbook.

Heat, work, temperature and ideal gases

• Temperature
• Thermal expansion of liquids and solids
• Ideal gas law
• Barometric equation - the exponential atmosphere
• Virial expansion for a gas
• Ideal gas - relation of average speed of molecules to temperature
• Effusion - gas leaking through a small hole
• Equipartition theorem - qualitative treatment
• Heat, work and temperature
• Compression work
• PV diagrams - a monatomic ideal gas follows a triangular cycle
• PV diagrams - a diatomic ideal gas undergoes a rectangular cycle
• Isothermal and adiabatic compression of an ideal gas
• Quasistatic adiabatic process in an ideal gas
• Adiabatic compression in a diesel engine
• Bulk modulus and the speed of sound
• Atmospheric convection
• Heat capacity and specific heat capacity
• Heat capacities at constant volume and pressure
• Measuring heat capacity at constant volume
• Latent heat
• Enthalpy
• Enthalpy in chemical reactions
• Enthalpy - a few examples
• Thermal conductivity - R values
• Heat equation
• Thermal conductivity of an ideal gas
• Viscosity of an ideal gas
• Diffusion in an ideal gas - Fick's law
• Diffusion equation
• Diffusion - a couple of examples
• Random walks and diffusion

Einstein solids, microstates and macrostates

• Binomial coefficients and probability
• Einstein solid
• Interacting Einstein solids
• Interacting Einstein solids - a few examples
• Two-state paramagnet as an Einstein solid
• Logarithms - a few properties
• Stirling's approximation for large factorials
• Einstein solids - multiplicity of large systems
• Interacting Einstein solids - sharpness of the multiplicity function
• Interacting Einstein solids - rectangular peak in multiplicity graph
• Paramagnets and coin flips - peak and width of multiplicity function
• Einstein solid - numerical solution
• Einstein solid - analytic solution for heat capacity

Entropy and the second law of thermodynamics

• Multiplicity of a 2-dim ideal gas
• Multiplicity of interacting ideal gases
• Entropy
• Entropy of an ideal gas - Sackur-Tetrode equation
• Entropy - a few examples
• Entropy of mixing
• Entropy of distinguishable molecules
• Temperature defined from entropy
• Entropy and temperature in a monatomic crystal
• Zeroth law of thermodynamics
• Thermal equilibrium for entropy plots
• Temperature of an Einstein solid
• Predicting heat capacity
• Third law of thermodynamics - residual entropy
• Entropy changes in macroscopic systems
• Two-state paramagnet - numerical solution
• Two-state paramagnet - analytic solution
• Two-state paramagnet - an experiment with DPPH
• Two-state paramagnet - entropy as a function of temperature
• Pressure in terms of entropy - the thermodynamic identity
• Entropy and heat
• Entropy of diamond and graphite
• Heat capacities in terms of entropy

Partition function

• Partition function
• Partition function and mean energy
• Heat capacity of degenerate system

Chemical potential

• Chemical potential - application to the Einstein solid
• Chemical potential of an ideal gas
• Chemical potential of a mixture of ideal gases

Heat engines

• Heat engines
• Carnot cycle
• Power plants as heat engines
• Carnot engine - a realistic version
• Internal combustion engine - the Otto cycle
• Diesel engines
• Stirling engine
• Steam engines - the Rankine cycle
• Steam engines in the real world
• Entropy of water and steam

Refrigerators

• Refrigerators
• Air conditioners
• Heat pumps
• Absorption refrigerators
• Refrigerators in the real world
• Throttling - enthalpy versus entropy
• Air conditioners in real life
• Liquefying gases - the Hampson-Linde cycle
• Enthalpy in the Hampson-Linde cycle
• Magnetic cooling
• Laser cooling