The First Law of Thermodynamics The first law of thermodynamics is based on the principle of conservation of energy When energy is put into a gas by heating it or doing work on it, its internal ene...
Work Done by a Gas When a gas expands, it does work on its surroundings by exerting pressure on the walls of the container it's in This is important, for example, in a steam engine where expanding ...
Defining Internal Energy Energy can generally be classified into two forms: kinetic or potential energy The molecules of all substances contain both kinetic and potential energies The amount of kin...
Average Kinetic Energy of a Molecule An important property of molecules in a gas is their average kinetic energy This can be deduced from the ideal gas equations relating pressure, volume, temperat...
Derivation of the Kinetic Theory of Gases Equation When molecules rebound from a wall in a container, the change in momentum gives rise to a force exerted by the particle on the wall Many molecules...
Assumptions of the Kinetic Theory of Gases Gases consist of atoms or molecules randomly moving around at high speeds The kinetic theory of gases models the thermodynamic behaviour of gases by linki...
Ideal Gas Equation The equation of state for an ideal gas (or the ideal gas equation) can be expressed as: pV = nRT The ideal gas equation can also be written in the form: pV = NkT An ideal gas is ...
Ideal Gases An ideal gas is one which obeys the relation: pV ∝ T Where: p = pressure of the gas (Pa) V = volume of the gas (m3) T = thermodynamic temperature (K) The molecules in a gas move around ...
Amount of Substance In thermodynamics, the amount of substance is measured in the SI unit ‘mole’ This has the symbol mol The mole is a unit of substance, not a unit of mass The mole is defined as: ...
