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THERMODYNAMICS – SYSTEMS IN EQUILIBRIUM AND NON-EQUILIBRIUM Edited by Juan Carlos Moreno-Piraján Thermodynamics – Systems in Equilibrium and Non-Equilibrium Edited by Juan Carlos Moreno-Piraján Published by InTech Janeza Trdine 9, 51000 Rijeka, Croatia Copyright © 2011 InTech All chapters are Open Access articles distributed under the Creative Commons Non Commercial Share Alike Attribution 3.0 license, which permits to copy, distribute, transmit, and adapt the work in any medium, so long as the original work is properly cited. After this work has been published by InTech, authors have the right to republish it, in whole or part, in any publication of which they are the author, and to make other personal use of the work. Any republication, referencing or personal use of the work must explicitly identify the original source. Statements and opinions expressed in the chapters are these of the individual contributors and not necessarily those of the editors or publisher. No responsibility is accepted for the accuracy of information contained in the published articles. The publisher assumes no responsibility for any damage or injury to persons or property arising out of the use of any materials, instructions, methods or ideas contained in the book. Publishing Process Manager Viktorija Zgela Technical Editor Teodora Smiljanic Cover Designer Jan Hyrat Image Copyright nikkytok, 2010. Used under license from Shutterstock.com First published September, 2011 Printed in Croatia A free online edition of this book is available at www.intechopen.com Additional hard copies can be obtained from [email protected] Thermodynamics – Systems in Equilibrium and Non-Equilibrium, Edited by Juan Carlos Moreno-Piraján p. cm. ISBN 978-953-307-283-8 free online editions of InTech Books and Journals can be found at www.intechopen.com Contents Preface IX Chapter 1 Thermodynamics of Seed and Plant Growth 1 Vesna Dragicevic and Slobodanka Sredojevic Chapter 2 The Concept of Temperature in the Modern Physics 21 Dmitrii Tayurskii and Alain Le Méhauté Chapter 3 Photosynthetic Productivity: Can Plants do Better? 35 John B. Skillman, Kevin L. Griffin, Sonya Earll and Mitsuru Kusama Chapter 4 Thermodynamics in Mono and Biphasic Continuum Mechanics 69 Henry Wong and Chin J Leo Chapter 5 Heat – Mechanically Induced Structure Development in Undrawn Polyester Fibers 89 Valentin Velev, Anton Popov and Bogdan Bogdanov Chapter 6 Conception of an Absorption Refrigerating System Operating at Low Enthalpy Sources 115 Nahla Bouaziz, Ridha BenIffa, Ezzedine Nehdi and Lakdar Kairouani Chapter 7 Non-Equilibrium Thermodynamics, Landscape Ecology and Vegetation Science 139 Vittorio Ingegnoli Chapter 8 The Mean-Field Theory in the Study of Ferromagnets and the Magnetocaloric Effect 173 J. S. Amaral, S. Das and V. S. Amaral Chapter 9 Entropy Generation in Viscoelastic Fluid Over a Stretching Surface 199 Saouli Salah and Aïboud Soraya VI Contents Chapter 10 From Particle Mechanics to Pixel Dynamics: Utilizing Stochastic Resonance Principle for Biomedical Image Enhancement 215 V.P.Subramanyam Rallabandi and Prasun Kumar Roy Chapter 11 Thermodynamics of Amphiphilic Drug Imipramine Hydrochloride in Presence of Additives 229 Sayem Alam, Abhishek Mandal and Asit Baran Mandal Chapter 12 Nonequilibrium Thermodynamics of Ising Magnets 255 Rıza Erdem and Gül Gülpınar Chapter 13 The Thermodynamics of Defect Formation in Self-Assembled Systems 279 Colm T. O’Mahony, Richard A. Farrell, Tandra Goshal, Justin D. Holmes and Michael A. Morris Preface Thermodynamics is one of the most exciting branches of physical chemistry which has greatly contributed to the modern science. Since its inception, great minds have built their theories of thermodynamics. One should name those of Sadi Carnot, Clapeyron Claussius, Maxwell, Boltzman, Bernoulli, Leibniz etc. Josiah Willard Gibbs had perhaps the greatest scientific influence on the development of thermodynamics. His attention was for some time focused on the study of the Watt steam engine. Analysing the balance of the machine, Gibbs began to develop a method for calculating the variables involved in the processes of chemical equilibrium. He deduced the phase rule which determines the degrees of freedom of a physicochemical system based on the number of system components and the number of phases. He also identified a new state function of thermodynamic system, the so-called free energy or Gibbs energy (G), which allows spontaneity and ensures a specific physicochemical process (such as a chemical reaction or a change of state) experienced by a system without interfering with the environment around it. The essential feature of thermodynamics and the difference between it and other branches of science is that it incorporates the concept of heat or thermal energy as an important part in the energy systems. The nature of heat was not always clear. Today we know that the random motion of molecules is the essence of heat. Some aspects of thermodynamics are so general and deep that they even deal with philosophical issues. These issues also deserve a deeper consideration, before tackling the technical details. The reason is a simple one - before one does anything, one must understand what they want. In the past, historians considered thermodynamics as a science that is isolated, but in recent years scientists have incorporated more friendly approach to it and have demonstrated a wide range of applications of thermodynamics. These four volumes of applied thermodynamics, gathered in an orderly manner, present a series of contributions by the finest scientists in the world and a wide range of applications of thermodynamics in various fields. These fields include the environmental science, mathematics, biology, fluid and the materials science. These four volumes of thermodynamics can be used in post-graduate courses for students and as reference books, since they are written in a language pleasing to the reader. X Preface They can also serve as a reference material for researchers to whom the thermodynamics is one of the area of interest. Juan Carlos Moreno-Piraján Department of Chemistry University of the Andes Colombia