Foundations of Statistical Mechanics Volume ii Nonequilibrium Phenomena

Designed for students familiar with abstract mathematical concepts but possessing little knowledge of physics, this graduate-level text was written by a member of the distinguished National Academy of Science. It opens with chapters on classical mechanics and proceeds to a survey of quantum mechanics; topics include the quantum-mechanical substitute for phase space; quantum dynamics and the Schrödinger equation; generalized coordinates; linear systems and the quantization of the electromagnetic field; and quantum-statistical mechanics. The final section on group theory and quantum mechanics of the atom explores spherical symmetry and spin, the n-electron atom and the Pauli exclusion principle, and other subjects. 1963 ed.

Fluid mechanics (FM) is a branch of science dealing with the investi­ gation of flows of continua under the action of external forces. The fundamentals of FM were laid in the works of the famous scientists, such as L. Euler, M. V. Lomonosov, D. Bernoulli, J. L. Lagrange, A. Cauchy, L. Navier, S. D. Poisson, and other classics of science. Fluid mechanics underwent a rapid development during the past two centuries, and it now includes, along with the above branches, aerodynamics, hydrodynamics, rarefied gas dynamics, mechanics of multi phase and reactive media, etc. The FM application domains were expanded, and new investigation methods were developed. Certain concepts introduced by the classics of science, however, are still of primary importance and will apparently be of importance in the future. The Lagrangian and Eulerian descriptions of a continuum, tensors of strains and stresses, conservation laws for mass, momentum, moment of momentum, and energy are the examples of such concepts and results. This list should be augmented by the first and second laws of thermodynamics, which determine the character and direction of processes at a given point of a continuum. The availability of the conservation laws is conditioned by the homogeneity and isotrop­ icity properties of the Euclidean space, and the form of these laws is related to the Newton's laws. The laws of thermodynamics have their foundation in the statistical physics.