Statistical Mechanics: a Concise Introduction

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Statistical Mechanics:

a Concise Introduction

Statistical Mechanics Home

· Probabilities

· Averaging

· Entropy

· Moles & Gas Constant

Statistical mechanics has the widest applications of any science. It determines a system’s gross properties from its microscopic attributes. Often the allowed energies of a substance, E₁, E₂,... are known from a theoretical model and a clever averaging process produces expressions for thermodynamic variables like average energy, pressure, and entropy.

Statistical mechanics, however, goes beyond classical thermodynamics in that it gives the probability that the system is in any particular state. A variety of averages can then be performed.

Here is a skeletal outline of statistical mechanics and thermodynamics in a few Web pages, Derivations are not included and, except for simple examples, applications are not developed here. Nevertheless, I hope you will find it a good overview of the structure and tools of the subject.

This outline assumes no prior study of thermodynamics or statistics. Readers with a background of one year of undergraduate calculus and one year of chemistry or physics are adequately prepared. The individual sections are relatively independent although I planned them in sequential order.

This outline is largely excerpted from a book that grew out of my lecture notes for a one-semester course in statistical mechanics. My department was puzzled to hear that requests for the notes far outstripped my class enrollment until we learned that students from other classes in thermodynamics and physical chemistry were using the notes as supplements. I took this as symptomatic of a need for a Concise Introduction to Statistical Mechanics and Thermodynamics. I kept the format and flavor of the lecture notes in the book. The result is the antithesis of bloated texts that are written to appease specialists. That minimalist philosophy is carried to an extreme in this mini-course.

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