Abstract. The derivation of the efficiency of Carnot cycle is usually done by calculating the heats involved in two isothermal processes and making use of the associated adiabatic relation for a given working substance's equation of state, usually the ideal gas. We present a derivation of Carnot efficiency using the same procedure with Redlich-Kwong gas as working substance to answer the calculation difficulties raised by Agrawal and Menon [1]. We also show that using the same procedure, the Carnot efficiency may be derived regardless of the functional form of the gas equation of state.
A short comment regarding the derivation of Lorentz transformation proposed by Iyer and Prabhu (2007 Eur. J. Phys. 11 183–90) is given. It is shown that the proposed derivation is similar to that appearing in the standard textbooks of classical mechanics, electrodynamics and the theory of relativity. In fact, those textbooks also provide an elegant form of the Lorentz matrix for the (3+1)-dimensional case, which Iyer and Prabhu claim to be difficult to attain because of its algebraic complexity. We also provide the derivation of the (3+1)-dimensional version of the Lorentz matrix using a method analogous to that proposed by Iyer and Prabhu, and show that the result is completely equivalent to the (3+1)-dimensional version appearing in the textbooks.
The Gaussian formula and spherical aberrations of the static and relativistic curved mirrors are analyzed using the optical path length (OPL) and Fermat's principle. The geometrical figures generated by the rotation of conic sections about their symmetry axes are considered for the shapes of the mirrors. By comparing the results in static and relativistic cases, it is shown that the focal lengths and the spherical aberration relations of the relativistic mirrors obey the Lorentz contraction. Further analysis of the spherical aberrations for both static and relativistic cases have resulted in the information about the limits for the paraxial approximation, as well as for the minimum speed of the systems to reduce the spherical aberrations.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.