Skip to main content

Addendum To Pressure and Chemical Potential - a question on hydrostatics

Submitted by Tony Rockwell on

The question was raised in class as to what the appropriate equilibrium condition for a column of fluid at rest should be. Specifically, given we expect a hydrostatic gradient in pressure with height, whether  the chemical potential must be the same throughout the column was questioned. Here are my first thoughts. In brief, I assert that  the chemical potential must be everywhere identical, and that the pv term is balanced, at every height in the column, by the potential energy conferred by position in a gravitational field.

Attachment Size
P and CP addendum.ppt 142 KB