Stress Potentials, Path Densities, and Relativistic Thermodynamics.

Dominic G. B. Edelen

ResearchPublished 1962

A companion piece to RM-3392-PR, On the Foundations of Relativistic Continuum Mechanics. The requirements that result in general relativistic stress potentials are shown to provide additional constitutive information concerning the properties of material bodies. The path density, which defines the intrinsic energy of a body, is shown to be path independent in an appropriate sense if the generalized stresses admit a stress potential. This suggests a decomposition of the generalized stresses, and specific integrability conditions are obtained for such decompositions. Fundamental differential relations on the trajectories of the energy flux field are obtained, and these are shown to result in natural definitions of temperature and entropy together with a statement of the second law of thermodynamics

Document Details

  • Copyright: RAND Corporation
  • Availability: Web Only
  • Year: 1962
  • Pages: 40
  • Document Number: RM-3433-PR

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Edelen, Dominic G. B., Stress Potentials, Path Densities, and Relativistic Thermodynamics. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 1962. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_memoranda/RM3433.html.
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