Pressure

Pressure ($p$) is the force per unit area applied on a surface, in a direction perpendicular to that surface, i.e. the scalar part of the stress tensor. In thermodynamics the pressure is given by

Failed to parse (SVG (MathML can be enabled via browser plugin): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle p = - \left.\frac{\partial A}{\partial V} \right\vert_{T,N} = k_BT \left.\frac{\partial \ln Q}{\partial V} \right\vert_{T,N}}

where Failed to parse (SVG (MathML can be enabled via browser plugin): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle A} is the Helmholtz energy function, Failed to parse (SVG (MathML can be enabled via browser plugin): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle V} is the volume, Failed to parse (SVG (MathML can be enabled via browser plugin): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle k_B} is the Boltzmann constant, $T$ is the temperature and Failed to parse (SVG (MathML can be enabled via browser plugin): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle Q (N,V,T)} is the canonical ensemble partition function.

Units

The SI units for pressure are Pascals (Pa), 1 Pa being 1 N/m², or 1 J/m³. Other frequently encountered units are bars and millibars (mbar); 1 mbar = 100 Pa = 1 hPa, 1 hectopascal. 1 bar is 10⁵ Pa by definition. This is very close to the standard atmosphere (atm), approximately equal to typical air pressure at earth mean sea level: atm, standard atmosphere = 101325 Pa = 101.325 kPa = 1013.25 hPa = 1.01325 bar

See also

• Pressure equation
• Virial pressure
• Test volume method