In the early days of civilization, heat was a great mystery. Humans considered it an element unto itself, along with earth, air, and water. This idea persisted until the time of Socrates (c. 470-399 b.c.) and Aristotle, who considered heat to be a...

The study of the relationship between heat and...

Thermodynamics, which comes from the Greek word meaning "heat motion" is the science that studies the transfer of energy among different bodies. When a typical power plant produces electricity, water is heated to produce steam by burning fuel. The...

Thermodynamics is the science that deals with work and heat, and the transformation of one into the other. It is a macroscopic theory, dealing with matter in bulk, disregarding the molecular nature of materials. The corresponding microscopic theory,...

Thermodynamics (from the Greek θερμη, therme, meaning "heat" and δυναμις, dynamis, meaning "power") is a branch of physics that studies the effects of changes in temperature, pressure, and volume on physical systems at the macroscopic scale...

Climate Change: If Al Gore was so confident about his global warming testimony, why did he break Senate rules requiring submission of an advance copy? Maybe to deny the "deniers" a chance to rebut his theories?Al Gore's contempt for global warming skeptics was shown by...

Gilbert Strang is a quiet man with a rare talent: helping others understand linear algebra. He's written a half-dozen popular college textbooks, and for years a few hundred students at the elite Massachusetts Institute of Technology have been privileged to take his course.Recently, with the...