J. Willard Gibbs
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Dissemination of Gibbs’s work (Path 1): Gibbs ➔ Maxwell ➔ Pupin ➔ Helmholtz ➔ van’t Hoff ➔ community
Gibbs’ work spread throughout Europe along two separate paths. As already mentioned (here), the first started with Maxwell. It was his book that indirectly led Gibbs’s work to Helmholtz along an interesting path taken by Michael Pupin (1858-1935).[1] As a doctoral student in experimental physics at the University of Berlin under Helmholtz, Pupin was familiar… Continue reading
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How Gibbs’s work spread into the science community
It is a great pity that many cultivators of the science of thermodynamics since the time of Gibbs have not gone back to the fountainhead and closely correlated their results with this. – F. G. Donnan [1] The exceptional man is always in advance of his generation. Willard Gibbs was not alone in failing at… Continue reading
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Why Gibbs’s maximum work equation continues to fascinate me
Classical thermodynamics doesn’t prescribe how to design a process but does set boundaries on what the process can achieve. These boundaries quantify either the maximum work generated by or the minimum work required for the process. The calculations behind these boundaries are invaluable for assessing the economic feasibility and practical potential of ideas. Gibbs helped… Continue reading
Block by Block – The Historical and Theoretical Foundations of Thermodynamics. “Hanlon has written a masterpiece.” – Mike Pauken, Senior Engineer, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) and author of Thermodynamics for Dummies
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About Me
Hi! I’m Bob Hanlon. After earning my Sc.D. in chemical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and enjoying a long career in both industry and academia, I’ve returned to school, my own self-guided school, seeking to better understand the world of thermodynamics. Please join me on my journey.
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