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[a] While processes in isolated systems are never reversible, [3] cyclical processes can be reversible or irreversible. [4] Reversible processes are hypothetical or idealized but central to the second law of thermodynamics. [3] Melting or freezing of ice in water is an example of a realistic process that is nearly reversible.
In some cases, when analyzing a thermodynamic process, one can assume that each intermediate state in the process is at equilibrium. Such a process is called quasistatic. [4] For a process to be reversible, each step in the process must be reversible. For a step in a process to be reversible, the system must be in equilibrium throughout the step.
For processes that include the transfer of matter, a further statement is needed. When two initially isolated systems are combined into a new system, then the total internal energy of the new system, U system , will be equal to the sum of the internal energies of the two initial systems, U 1 and U 2 : U s y s t e m = U 1 + U 2 . {\displaystyle ...
A thermodynamic cycle consists of linked sequences of thermodynamic processes that involve transfer of heat and work into and out of the system, while varying pressure, temperature, and other state variables within the system, and that eventually returns the system to its initial state. [1]
For any irreversible process, since entropy is a state function, we can always connect the initial and terminal states with an imaginary reversible process and integrating on that path to calculate the difference in entropy. Now reverse the reversible process and combine it with the said irreversible process.
Cyclic processes were important conceptual devices in the early days of thermodynamical investigation, while the concept of the thermodynamic state variable was being developed. (3) Defined by flows through a system, a flow process is a steady state of flows into and out of a vessel with definite wall properties. The internal state of the ...
For a particular reversible process in general, the work done reversibly on the system, ,, and the heat transferred reversibly to the system, , are not required to occur respectively adiabatically or adynamically, but they must belong to the same particular process defined by its particular reversible path, , through the space of thermodynamic ...
The equal sign refers to a reversible process, which is an imagined idealized theoretical limit, never actually occurring in physical reality, with essentially equal temperatures of system and surroundings. [10] [11] For an isentropic process, if also reversible, there is no transfer of energy as heat because the process is adiabatic; δQ = 0 ...