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Fundamentals of classical and statistical thermodynamics

Subject area: General Physics.

Description: This is a broad exploration of classical and statistical thermodynamics, extending from the very basics such as energy and temperature to a range of more involved and conceptually difficult ideas.

Authors: Bimalendu N. Roy.

Publishers/Suppliers: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. John Wiley and Sons, Ltd. (www.wiley.co.uk).

Date/Edition: 2002.

ISBN: 0-470-84313-6.

Level: Undergraduate, research.

Price: £32 (paperback), £75 (hardback).

Review

Bimalendu N. Roy’s “Fundamentals of classical and statistical thermodynamics” is a broad exploration of subject area, extending from the very basics such as energy and temperature to a range of more involved and conceptually difficult ideas. The author aims this book at junior undergraduates, with some sections being more appropriate for senior undergraduates and post-graduates. I feel that this aim is achieved, and the book might well serve as a core text over a full degree course, and would provide teachers with an excellent reference text.

The wide range of the book along with the style of the author leads to a book of more than 700 pages. However, within this a substantial fraction is given over to worked examples, exercises and their solutions, leading ultimately to a highly readable and useful text. Broadly speaking, the first half of the book is dedicated to classical thermodynamics followed by an account of statistical thermodynamics. The book is introduced by two chapters that set out the importance of this core area of physics, along with a handy glossary style set of definitions of terms commonly used in this field. The following chapters progress through the “four laws” of thermodynamics, at each stage clearly defining the applicability and in many areas giving concrete examples and applications. The remaining classical chapters pertain to free energy and chemical processes, and it is in the latter of these that the reader might see one of the more clear indications of application to ‘real problems’. The statistical thermodynamics sections occupy slightly less space. These remaining chapters introduce in more detail statistical concepts (following brief descriptions in earlier chapters), relate them to classical thermodynamics and cover in detail concepts of phase equilibrium/changes, and heat capacities, as well as Maxwellian, Fermi-Dirac, Boltzmann and Bose-Einstein distributions.

The book generally flows logically from the basics to rather advanced ideas, with the occasional occurrence of unexplained terms that are to be visited later in the text. At the end of the book there are a number of helpful appendices, including extensive tables of enthalpies of formation, free energies and standard entropies (although there is some repetition of some values in different tables), and an appendix detailing some useful mathematical tools.

The book is well laid out with good use of diagrams and an accessible terminology. The writing style is generally very clear, although in some places the explanations are a little verbose and in others one might welcome more detail, especially in the derivations of some of the more complicated expressions where one might be left wondering how various steps are made.

A common problem with books on thermodynamics is one of the “dryness” of the necessarily mathematical description. Sometimes there are derivations of complicated quantities that are conceptually unclear. The current book does suffer to an extent of these problems, and one is sometimes left wondering what significance the derived quantities have in the general scheme of things. This is somewhat mitigated by the use of examples and exercises, and one should remember that many books in this area fail to go much beyond the mathematical concepts. These somewhat nebulous criticisms of the current book should be viewed as irritations rather than serious failings and overall this book can be described as easy to read.

To a certain extent the level of mathematics required to use this book is rather modest, with much of the derivations being simple matters of algebra. However, for anything other than a superficial use of this book one would need a fair competence in calculus, but this should be well within the scope of an undergraduate physics course, for example. Beyond the mathematical aspects, it would also be useful for a reader to have a basic knowledge of chemistry, if only to appreciate some of the more significant applications that are investigated in depth in the book.

So far as I have found, the exercises are well posed and the solutions accurate. They, along with the worked examples in the text, then form an essential supplement to the text, without which it would tend to be rather abstract.

There are a number of (presumably) typographical errors in the text, and more importantly in the mathematics, which might confuse the novice. On balance, however, the number of errors, which unfortunately seem to be inevitable in such mathematically based textbooks, is rather small and certainly not enough to form a serious criticism.

In summary “Fundamentals of classical and statistical thermodynamics” is to be recommended as a text for a range of thermodynamics courses. The content of the book is accessible and, if not a core text for a lecture course, would certainly be excellent as supplementary reading or a resource for teaching. The cost is comparable to other books in the area of thermodynamics and statistical mechanics.

From the publisher... Fundamentals of Classical and Statistical Thermodynamics Bimalendu Narayan Roy Fundamentals of Classical and Statistical Thermodynamics provides a comprehensive introduction to this pivotal subject. Starting from basics, the book begins with a thorough introduction to the field, providing concise definitions and an overview of thermodynamics and its applications. 0-470-84313-6 768pp 2002 £75.00

Jonathan Goss
School of Physics
Stocker Road
Exeter University
Exeter EX4 4QL
October 2002