Abstract
Currently-available technology enables man to cool matter (silver nuclei) to 8 × 10-10 K or to heat it (plasma in a tokamak) to 108 K. Compared to these extremes of temperature, separated by a factor of more than 1017—which can only increase with the passage of time, as further progress is made—everyday life and work are restricted to a narrow range indeed, as indicated in Fig. 1.1.
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Further reading
Barron, R. Cryogenic Systems. McGraw-Hill, New York and London (1966).
Dugdale, J.S. Entropy and Low Temperature Physics. Hutchinson, London (1966).
Hands, B.A. (ed.) Cryogenic Engineering. Academic Press, London (1986).
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MacDonald, D.K.C. Introductory Statistical Mechanics for Physicists. Wiley, New York and London (1963).
Mendelssohn, K. The Quest for Absolute Zero: the Meaning of Low Temperature Physics, 2nd edn., Taylor and Francis, London (1977). (An historical perspective, readily accessible even to nonspecialists.)
Pippard, A.B. Elements of Classical Thermodynamics. Cambridge University Press (1957).
Rosenberg, H.M. Low Temperature Solid State Physics. Clarendon Press, Oxford (1963).
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Tilley, D.R. and Tilley, J. Superfluidity and Superconductivity,3rd edn., Adam Hilger, Bristol (1990). (Emphasizes, particularly, the role played by the macroscopic wave function.)
Wilks, J. The Third Law of Thermodynamics. Oxford University Press (1961).
Zemansky, M.W. and Dittman, R.H. Heat and Thermodynamics. 6th edn., McGraw-Hill, New York (1981).
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© 1992 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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Mc McClintock, P.V.E., Meredith, D.J., Wigmore, J.K. (1992). Introduction. In: Low-Temperature Physics: an introduction for scientists and engineers. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-2276-4_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-011-2276-4_1
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