Mesoscopic Thermodynamics for Scientists and Engineers

＂Thermodynamics is a keystone of physical science, bridging the gap between fundamentals and applications. However, when comparing the content of traditional courses and texts in thermodynamics with what today’s engineers do in practice, one notices a widening discrepancy. New and emerging technologies and product designs deal with subjects such as bio-membrane and gene engineering, micro-reactor chemistry and microcapsule drug delivery, micro-fluids and porous media, nanoparticles and nanostructures, supercritical-fluid extraction, and strongly fluctuating phase-change materials. Engineers often must design processes for systems where ＂macroscopic＂ thermodynamics becomes insufficient. Mesoscopic thermodynamics can be defined as a semi-phenomenological approach to phenomena in systems where a length -- intermediate between the atomistic scale and the macroscopic scale -- emerges and where such a length explicitly affects the physical properties and phase behavior.＂--

Mikhail A. Anisimov is a Distinguished Professor Emeritus and Research Professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and the Institute for Physical Science and Technology at the University of Maryland, College Park. Dr. Anisimov is an internationally recognized scientist who has been investigating phase transitions and critical phenomena in soft condensed matter for more than fifty years. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society, American Institute of Chemical Engineers, and American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Thomas J. Longo is a Research Engineer at Barron Associates, Inc., focusing on machine learning applications to science and engineering practice. Dr. Longo completed a PhD in Chemical Physics from the University of Maryland, College Park in 2023, where he also serves as an Adjunct Research Associate. His research interests include theoretical and computational studies of thermodynamics and dynamics of phase transitions affected by chemical reactions, liquid polyamorphism, and dissipative mesoscopic strictures.