Basic Concepts

Durjoy Kumar Paul

Lecturer, Department of
Mech. Eng., RUET,
Rajshahi- 6204.

ME – 2101 (Thermodynamics)
❑ Thermodynamics is a funny subject. The first time you go through it, you don’t understand it at
all. The second time you go through it, you think you understand it, except for one or two small
points. The third time you go through it, you know you don’t understand it, but by that time you
are so used to it, so it doesn’t bother you any more.

-Arnold Sommerfeld
 Thermodynamic System
• A thermodynamic system is simply any object, quantity of matter or
a region of space that is selected for thermodynamic study.
Everything that is not part of the system is referred to as the
Surroundings.

• Boundary or Control Surface separates the system from its

surroundings which:

• may be real or imaginary, at rest or in motion

• may change its shape and size
• neither contains matter nor occupies volume
• has zero thickness and a property value at a point on the
boundary is shared by both system and surroundings.
Thermodynamic System
Control Mass (CM) or Closed System
❑ In Control Mass (CM) or Closed system, the CS is closed to mass flow, so
that no mass can escape from or enter into the system. Heat & work may
cross the CS.
Control Volume (CV) or Open System
❑ When there is flow of mass through CS, the system is called a Control
Volume (CV) or Open system.
Adiabatic System
In Adiabatic system the boundary is impermeable to heat.
Classification of Thermodynamic System

An Isolated system is a special case of CM system that does not interact in any way with
its surroundings.
State and Property
❑ The condition of a system at any instant of time is called its state. State at a
given instant determines the properties of the system.

❑ A property is a quantity whose numerical value depends on the state but not
on the history of the system. The origin of properties include those
❖ directly measurable
❖ defined by laws of thermodynamics
❖ defined by mathematical combinations of other properties.

❑ Two states are identical if, and only if, the properties of the two states are
identical.

❑ Intensive properties are independent of the size or extent of the system.

❑ Extensive properties depend on the size or extent of the system. An extensive

property is additive in the sense that its value for the whole system is the sum
of the values for its parts.
Extensive and Intensive Property
State Postulate
❑ The number of properties required to fix the state of a system is given by the
state postulate:

“The state of a simple compressible system is completely specified by two

independent, intensive properties.”

❑ A system is called a simple compressible system in the absence of electrical,

magnetic, gravitational, motion, and surface tension effects.

❑ The state postulate requires that the two properties specified be independent
to fix the state. Two properties are independent if one property can be varied
while the other one is held constant.
Processes and Cycles
A thermodynamic process is the succession of thermodynamic states that a system passes
through as it goes from an initial state to a final state.

A system process is said to go through a thermodynamic cycle when the final state and
the initial state of the process are same.
Thermodynamic Equilibrium
❑ A system in thermodynamic equilibrium satisfies the following stringent
requirements:

1. Mechanical Equilibrium: no unbalance forces acting on any part of the

system or the system as a whole.

2. Thermal Equilibrium: no temperature differences between parts of the

system or between the system and the surrounding.

3. Chemical Equilibrium: no chemical reactions within the system and no

motion of any chemical species from one part to another part of the system.

❑ Any property has a fixed value in a given (equilibrium) state, regardless of how
the system arrives at the state.
Quasi – Equilibrium Process
❑ When the process is carried out in such a way that at every instant, the system
deviation from the thermodynamic equilibrium is infinitesimal, then the
process is known as quasi-static or quasi-equilibrium process and each state
in the process may be considered as an equilibrium state.

❑ A quasi-equilibrium process can be viewed as a sufficiently slow process that

allows the system to adjust itself internally so that properties in one part of the
system do not change any faster than those at other parts.
Quasi – Equilibrium Process
Equilibrium State
❑ A system is said to be in Stable/Equilibrium State when no finite change of state can occur
unless there is an interaction between the system and its environment which leaves a finite
alteration in the state of the environment.

❑ During a quasi-static process, the system is at all times infinitesimally near a state of
thermodynamic equilibrium. So, the process should be carried out infinitely slow to allow the
system to settle to a stable state at the end of each infinitesimal step in the
process.

❑ Theoretical calculations must relate to stable states, since it is only for these we have
thermodynamic data.
Thermometer and Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics

❑ Any object with at least one measurable property that changes as its temperature
changes can be used as a thermometer. Such a property is called a thermometric
property. The particular substance that exhibits changes in the thermometric property
is known as a thermometric substance.

Zero’th Law of Thermodynamics

• Two systems with thermal equilibrium with a third are in thermal equilibrium with each
other.