The Fundamentals of Atomic and Molecular Physics

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Raymond Brun, Lucien Z. Dumitrescu

This volume deals with chemical kinetics of high-temperature shocked flows. The first papers describe the kinetics of many processes in gases and gas mixtures behind shock waves in shock tubes, including decomposition, oxidation, dissociation and various reactions, with the general purpose of measuring corresponding rate constants by various diagnostic techniques. Other papers treat problems of induced combustion behind shock paves propagating in combustible media. Theoretical and experimental studies on nonequilibrium flows in external and internal aerodynamics, including vibrational relaxation, dissociation and reaction kinetics and radiation effects, and the analysis of ionization phenomena induced by shock waves and of the behavior of shock waves in ionized media such as plasma jets, discharges or magnetic fields are represented. This volume is for chemists and chemical engineers working in reaction kinetics and combustion fields, plasma physicists, astrophysicists and also aerodynamicists simulating or computing relaxing reactive flows.

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Kiyoyuki Terakura, Hisazumi Akai

Structural stability is of fundamental importance in materials science. Up-to-date information on the theoretical aspects of phase stability of materials is contained in this volume. Most of the first-principles calculations are based on the local-density approximation (LDA). In contrast, this volume contains very recent results of "going beyond LDA", such as the density gradient expansion and the quantum Monte-Carlomethod. Following the recently introduced theoretical methods for the calculation of interatomic potentials, forces acting on atoms and total energies such as the Car-Parrinello, the effective-medium and the bond-ordermethod, attempts have been made to develop even more sophisticated methods such as the order-N method in electronic-structure calculations. The present status of these methods and their application to real systems are described. In addition, in order to study the phase stability atfinite temperatures, the microscopic calculations have to be combined with statistical treatment of the systems to describe, e.g. order-disorder transitions on the Si(001) surface or alloy phase diagrams. This book contains examples for this type of calculations.

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Norman H. March, Joseph F. Mucci

In this introductory chemical physics textbook, the authors discuss the interactions, bonding, electron density, and experimental techniques of free molecules, and apply spectroscopic methods to determine molecular parameters, dynamics, and chemical reactions.

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Pascal Richet

Given that thermodynamics books are not a rarity on the market, why would an additional one be useful? The answer is simple: at any level, thermodynamics is usually taught as a somewhat abstruse discipline where many students get lost in a maze of difficult concepts. However, thermodynamics is not as intricate a subject as most people feel. This book fills a niche between elementary textbooks and mathematically oriented treatises, and provides readers with a distinct approach to the subject. As indicated by the title, this book explains thermodynamic phenomena and concepts in physical terms before proceeding to focus on the requisite mathematical aspects. It focuses on the effects of pressure, temperature and chemical composition on thermodynamic properties and places emphasis on rapidly evolving fields such as amorphous materials, metastable phases, numerical simulations of microsystems and high-pressure thermodynamics. Topics like redox reactions are dealt with in less depth, due to the fact that there is already much literature available. Without requiring a background in quantum mechanics, this book also illustrates the main practical applications of statistical thermodynamics and gives a microscopic interpretation of temperature, pressure and entropy.<br/> This book is perfect for undergraduate and graduate students who already have a basic knowledge of thermodynamics and who wish to truly <em>understand</em> the subject and put it in a broader physical perspective. The book is aimed not at theoretical physicists, but rather at practitioners with a variety of backgrounds from physics to biochemistry for whom thermodynamics is a tool which would be better used if better understood.