Atkins' 4 Laws that Drive the Universe: Chapter 3 notes

Where we are so far:

The zeroth law necessitated the definition of a property called, temperature, T, a parameter for the distribution of energy within a system of particles at equilibrium ("relative populations fo the differenet energy levels of particles in a system at equilibrium"; "turmoil and temperature go hand in hand" is a useful mnemonic).

The first law brought about the definition of a quantity called the internal enrgy of a system ,U

The second law implies the existence of a property called entropy S

Useful summarization contrasting energy and entropy:

"...whereas U is a measure of the quantity of energy that a system possesses, S is a measure of the quality of that energy: low entropy means high quality, high entropy means low quality."

To be continued...

Atkins' discussion of both the Kelvin and the Clausius phenomenological, or observation-based, statements could use a little more clarification.  I understand that what he was trying to do was to lead up to the more familiar statement of the second law (the entropy of the universe increases during a spontaneous process).  I did not think that he defined what spontaneous means precisely.

In this chapter, he repeats a good summarization of the first and second law that is found in his P. Chem. textbook:

"The first law and the internal energy identify the feasible change among all conceivable changes: a process is feasible only if the total energy of the universe remains the same.  The second law and entropy identify the spontaneous changes among these feasible changes: a feasible process is spontaneous only if the total entropy of the universe increases."

Good analogy of the inverse propotionality between change in entropy and its direct proportionality to energy released or absorbed:  sneezing in a quiet library has more impact than sneezing in a loud busy street.

Atkin's 4 Laws that Drive the Universe: Chapter 2 Notes

This chapter is on the first law of thermodynamics, the law of energy conservation.  Many of the things brought up by Atkins here I am familiar with, in particular the moelcular basis of work and heat.

It is interesting to see him put in words however a reverse way of relating work and energy.  Work is something can be quantified using mechanistic terms and properties as work can simply be measured as the product of force applied through a certain distance.  This gives him then a basis for defining what energy is: energy is what gives a system the capacity to do work.  But, as is familiar to wveryone, this entity energy can also be lost or gained in the form of heat.  Here is then is where he launches on to how heat and work are processes by which the energy of a system can change.

Of course, heat capacity was also discussed as this is a property that is indicative of the variations that different susbtances can dissipate heat.

He introduces the term enthalpy as simply a bookkeeping property for which there is no molecular foundation can be discerned.  I appreciated his statement that only fundamental properties like energy and entropy can more readily be described at the molecular level and not bookkeeping proerpties like ethalpy.

I did not appreciate, however, the vagueness with which he tried to explain what a reversible process is :-(.

A couple of quotes I like:

"Work is energy tamed, and required greater sophistication to contrive.  Thus, humanity stumbled easily on to fire but needed millenia to arrive at the sophistication of the steam engine, the internal combustion engine, and the jet engine."

"Precise molecular interpretations can be given only of the fundamental properties of a system, its temperature, its internal energy, and - ... - the entropy.  They cannot be given for accounting properties , properties that have simply been contrived to make calcualtions easier. " (e.g., enthalpy).

This is what I like about Atkins' writing, his ability to express these thoughts using precise and simple language.

Atkins' 4 Laws that Drive the Universe: Chapter 1 notes

In the first chapter, Atkins introduces some useful terms to allow the reader to follow a long a layman's version of the zeroth law and how it came about.

The zeroth law came about to describe what property changes may be observed when two systems bounded by diathermic walls (e.g., metal walls) are placed in contact with each other.  If no property change is observed, then the two systems are said to be in thermal equilibrium.  This became the basis for what we observe as the temperature of the system measured by a thermometer.  The exact language of the zeroth law as state by Atkins is:

If system A is in thermal equilibrium with system B and with system C, then systems B and C are in thermal equilibrium with each other. (Slightly paraphrased)

He then goes on to differentiate classical thermodynamics (dealing with observations of bulk properties like pressure that can be observed mechanically) from statistical thermodynamics dealing with an understanding of (mostly mathematically) bulk properties based on a statistical (average behavior) description of the behavior of the particles.

Good description of the equilibrium state of a system being that, the properties are unchanging even though atoms are still transitioning from one energy state to another.  However, because there is no net change in the distribution of atoms in different energy states, the system is said to be in thermodynamic equilibrium.

In this section, he also reviews the origin of the Boltzmann constant k, as related to the beta variable where beta = 1/kT.  The beta variable parametrizes the fraction of particles with a certain energy E (e^-beta*E), with respect to the measured kelvin temperature for the system.  This fraction is exponential in nature and is an increasing function with respect to T and decreasing function with respect to E.

As Atkins noted early in the chapter, this law is an afterthought.  Certainly, it was not something that was prominent in my mind remembering back to my early introductions to thermodynamics.  Perhaps it is a way to formally define the property of a system we call temperature.

Book Reading Update

I have started reading my second book on the four laws of tehrmodynamics, also by Atkins.

I have also started reading a book on the history of the field of electromagnetism byput decided to set it aside for now.

Lab Manual Conversion to Electronic Files Update

I have completed the first stage of cleaning up the OCR files for 30A and 30B and only one experiment left for 31.  As I do these clean-ups, I have been documenting the small changes I have been making, a list of suggested further changes, and tasks that need to be done in the lab.  I have sent one of these to both Rob Schmidt and Richard Grow for comments for the 30A lab manual.

Start of Chemistry SLO RESEARCH

Today I took the first step in my research for the implementation of student learning outcomes process for various community college programs.  I decided that my strategy would be to, first of all, gather as much as I can from websites and then contact individuals by email to request responses to four or five questions I have outlined in my sabbatical proposal:  what the SLO's are, how they are assesed, what type of analysis and dialogue take place, and how they are integrated into program planning.

My first google search used the keywords chemistry student learning outcomes.  One of the surprising results to me was the fact that less than 10% of the first 4 pages of results were for community colleges.  Some of these include, Mt Sac, Sacramento City College, Moorpark, and College of San Mateo.  I believe all of these list their chemistry SLO's online but only one showed a full report showing the SLO, assessment method, results, analysis, and plans.  This was Sacramento City College.  I like the excel spreadsheet they use to document results and I plan to suggest to Mike and Rich the use of a similar spreadsheet to document our own results.

I also looked at the Santa Rosa Junior College's website to see what their SLO's are but I couldn't find them on the website. I chose this college because I know that they typically get very good accreditation evaluations.

After further internet research, my next plan is to identify ten colleges to contact by email with the questions.  I will likely share with them what our current process is.  I am hoping out of these 10, at least three will give me a complete report!