Irreversible Processes: Kinetic Theory

by Stephen G. Brush

Kinetic Theory, Volume 2: Irreversible Processes deals with the kinetic theory of gases and the irreversible processes they undergo. It includes the two papers by James Clerk Maxwell and Ludwig Boltzmann in which the basic equations for transport processes in gases are formulated, together with the first derivation of Boltzmann's "H-theorem" and a discussion of this theorem, along with the problem of irreversibility.Comprised of 10 chapters, this volume begins with an introduction to the fundamental nature of heat and of gases, along with Boltzmann's work on the kinetic theory of gases and statistical mechanics. Energy dissipation, the statistical nature of the second law of thermodynamics, and the eternal return and the recurrence paradox are also considered. The first chapter examines the dynamical theory of gases and its application to the explanation of various properties of gases; the known chemical relation between the density of a gas and its equivalent weight, commonly called the Law of Equivalent Volumes; and the diffusion of one gas through another. Subsequent chapters focus on the thermal equilibrium of gas molecules; the three-body problem and the equations of dynamics; the mechanical theory of heat; and the relation of a general mechanical theorem to the second law of thermodynamics. A mechanical explanation of irreversible processes is also offered.This book will be useful for students of physics at the advanced undergraduate or beginning postgraduate level.

262 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 22, 2013

About the author

A scholar in the history of science, Stephen George Brush earned his BS in physics at Harvard University and his D.Phil. at Oxford University. After a year as a National Science Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow at Imperial College London, Brush worked as a physicist at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California in the area of statistical mechanics from 1959 until 1965. He was a lecturer in Physics at Harvard University from 1965 until 1968, and a historian of science at the University of Maryland, College Park from 1968 until his retirement as Distinguished Professor of the History of Science in 2007.