Say I have a volume of hydrogen gas that is raised to a temperature T so that 99.9 percent of the gas is ionized. If now, with the plasma at some pressure P, the volume is compressed a small volume dV such that no energy leaves the volume I'm curious of a total accounting of where the energy PdV goes.
Some energy goes into heating the plasma and some energy goes into "heating" the photon gas?
This is not a statics problem but is there an average total electrostatic energy that can be computed and does it change during compression? The electrostatic energy of a compressed neutral plasma confuses me.
What about the magnetic energy of the moving charges, their average speed increases but the volume decreases so does the total magnetic energy change?
I may be mixing classical and quantum, any clarifications welcome.
Thanks for any help!
Some energy goes into heating the plasma and some energy goes into "heating" the photon gas?
This is not a statics problem but is there an average total electrostatic energy that can be computed and does it change during compression? The electrostatic energy of a compressed neutral plasma confuses me.
What about the magnetic energy of the moving charges, their average speed increases but the volume decreases so does the total magnetic energy change?
I may be mixing classical and quantum, any clarifications welcome.
Thanks for any help!