Thermal capacities and polytropic processes

Abstract

Herein, we analyse polytropic processes for an ideal gas within the wider concept of thermal capacity. To answer the question of whether the thermal capacity is a process, path, or state function, we argue that it should be tentatively set as a path function and if it remains constant along the path, the corresponding process is polytropic. Of all the paths, there are only two, at constant volume and constant pressure, for which the thermal capacities, Cv and Cp, are state functions, i.e., system properties. The discussions herein are valuable both scientifically and instructively because they shed light on issues in undergraduate curricula that are not addressed in sufficient detail in physics textbooks, not even in the most advanced ones.