Thermodynamics
Real thermodynamics for talented high schoolers.
Online from anywhere · or in-person in Princeton, NJ
A World Through the Lens of Thermodynamics
Thermodynamics is one of the six classical core courses of the Physics Lyceum: High School curriculum, taught on the Deep Physics model that runs through the whole SoTS Physics Lyceum.
The course runs on theory, problem-solving sessions, homework, and practical laboratory work. The Lyceum provides the equipment, and tuition covers it.
1. Temperature, Heat, and the Zeroth Law
The starting point: what these words actually mean in physics. Thermal equilibrium, the zeroth law, and the operational definition of temperature. The distinction between heat and internal energy. Specific heat, latent heat, and calorimetry as the first quantitative tools of the theory.
2. The First Law and Energy Conservation
Energy conservation, extended to include heat. Internal energy as a state function. Work done by and on a system. The first law as accounting: energy in, energy out, and what stays. Isothermal, adiabatic, isobaric, and isochoric processes traced on a pressure–volume diagram.
3. Kinetic Theory of Gases and Transport Phenomena
Where pressure and temperature come from, microscopically. Molecules in motion, momentum transfer to walls, and the derivation of the ideal gas law from Newtonian mechanics. The Maxwell distribution of speeds. The equipartition theorem and why temperature is a measure of average kinetic energy per degree of freedom. Mean free path. Transport phenomena: diffusion, thermal conductivity, and gas viscosity, all rooted in the same molecular picture.
4. Entropy and the Second Law
Reversible and irreversible processes. Entropy as a state function defined by reversible heat flow over temperature. The second law as a one-way constraint on the universe. Boltzmann’s statistical interpretation: entropy as a count of microstates compatible with a given macrostate, S = k ln W.
5. Heat Engines and the Carnot Cycle
The hard limit on every engine ever built. Heat engines, refrigerators, and heat pumps as cycles on a P–V diagram. The Carnot cycle and the proof that no engine operating between two reservoirs can be more efficient than a reversible (Carnot) engine operating between the same two. Why this limit follows from the second law alone, independent of any technology.
6. Phase Transitions, Real Gases, and Thermodynamic Potentials
Why ice melts at zero degrees and water boils at one hundred. Phase diagrams and the Clausius–Clapeyron relation. Latent heat in transitions. Real gases past the ideal-gas regime: the Van der Waals equation and the critical point where the gas–liquid distinction vanishes. Free energies (Helmholtz and Gibbs) as the right quantities to minimize when temperature or pressure is held fixed. The thermodynamic foundation for chemistry, materials, and biology.
The specific topics, and the depth given to each, may shift depending on class priorities and the dynamics of the cohort.