First Order Equations
- General system
- Particular systems
Just as with the internal energy version of the fundamental equation, the chain rule can be used on the above equations to find k+2 equations of state with respect to the particular potential. If Φ is a thermodynamic potential, then the fundamental equation may be expressed as:
where the are the natural variables of the potential. If is conjugate to then we have the equations of state for that potential, one for each set of conjugate variables.
Only one equation of state will not be sufficient to reconstitute the fundamental equation. All equations of state will be needed to fully characterize the thermodynamic system. Note that what is commonly called "the equation of state" is just the "mechanical" equation of state involving the Helmholtz potential and the volume:
For an ideal gas, this becomes the familiar PV=NkBT.
Read more about this topic: Thermodynamic Equations
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