"Thermodynamics is a branch of physics that deals with heat, work, and temperature, and their relation to energy, entropy, and the physical properties of matter and radiation."
The branch of physical chemistry concerned with the relationships between heat, work, and energy.
Laws of Thermodynamics: These are the foundational principles of thermodynamics and describe the behavior of energy and matter in physical systems.
Thermodynamic Processes: These are ways in which thermodynamic systems can change, such as isothermal, isobaric, adiabatic, and isentropic processes.
First Law of Thermodynamics: This is the principle of energy conservation, which states that energy cannot be created or destroyed, only transferred or converted from one form to another.
Second Law of Thermodynamics: This principle describes the irreversibility of certain thermodynamic processes and the tendency of systems to move towards a state of maximum entropy.
Entropy: This is a measurement of the disorder or randomness of a system and is related to the second law of thermodynamics.
Enthalpy: This is a measurement of the heat content of a system and is often used in chemical reactions to determine the energy released or absorbed.
Heat Capacity: This is a measure of how much heat energy is required to raise the temperature of a substance by a certain amount.
Phase Changes: These are transitions between solid, liquid, and gaseous states of matter and involve changes in energy and entropy.
Chemical Equilibrium: This is a state in which the rates of the forward and reverse reactions in a chemical reaction are equal, leading to a steady state with no further change in concentrations.
Solutions: These are mixtures of two or more substances and their thermodynamic properties are important in understanding how solutes dissolve in solvents.
Thermodynamic Cycles: These are closed systems in which energy is transferred through a series of processes and are commonly used in power plants and refrigeration systems.
Statistical Thermodynamics: This is the application of statistical methods to large ensembles of particles in order to predict their thermodynamic properties.
Gibbs Free Energy: This is a measure of the maximum amount of work that can be obtained from a system and is often used to determine the spontaneity of reactions.
Chemical Potential: L: This is a measure of the potential energy of a substance to undergo chemical change and is important in understanding chemical reactions and phase transitions.
Reaction Rates: The rate at which chemical reactions occur are crucial in understanding how thermodynamics affect chemical reactions.
Classical Thermodynamics: It deals with the fundamentals of thermodynamics such as the first, second, and third laws of thermodynamics, energy, entropy, work, and heat. Classical thermodynamics is concerned with macroscopic properties of matter.
Statistical Thermodynamics: It is also known as Statistical Mechanics. It is concerned with the behavior of large ensembles of microscopic particles. By using statistical methods and probability theory, this field deals with predicting the behavior of matter at a molecular level. Statistical thermodynamics is used to explain such phenomena as phase transitions, reaction rates, diffusion, and transport properties.
"The behavior of these quantities is governed by the four laws of thermodynamics which convey a quantitative description using measurable macroscopic physical quantities."
"The behavior of these quantities may be explained in terms of microscopic constituents by statistical mechanics."
"Thermodynamics applies to a wide variety of topics in science and engineering, especially physical chemistry, biochemistry, chemical engineering, and mechanical engineering, but also in other complex fields such as meteorology."
"Historically, thermodynamics developed out of a desire to increase the efficiency of early steam engines."
"French physicist Sadi Carnot (1824) who believed that engine efficiency was the key that could help France win the Napoleonic Wars."
"Scots-Irish physicist Lord Kelvin was the first to formulate a concise definition of thermodynamics in 1854."
"German physicist and mathematician Rudolf Clausius restated Carnot's principle known as the Carnot cycle and gave the theory of heat a truer and sounder basis."
"His most important paper, 'On the Moving Force of Heat,' published in 1850, first stated the second law of thermodynamics."
"In 1865 he introduced the concept of entropy."
"In 1870 he introduced the virial theorem, which applied to heat."
"The initial application of thermodynamics to mechanical heat engines was quickly extended to the study of chemical compounds and chemical reactions."
"Chemical thermodynamics studies the nature of the role of entropy in the process of chemical reactions."
"Statistical thermodynamics, or statistical mechanics, concerns itself with statistical predictions of the collective motion of particles from their microscopic behavior."
"In 1909, Constantin Carathéodory presented a purely mathematical approach in an axiomatic formulation, a description often referred to as geometrical thermodynamics."