The Boltzmann Lament
No greater love, some chemists say,
than that of Boltzmann and his k.
The constant made him quite afflicted
and to an early grave (he self-inflicted).
How can we live with this duplicity
in a world of endless multiplicities?
I once tried to clean my room, you see,
But the universe increased its entropy.
Could anyone ever truly follow
such a sad lifetime full of sorrow?
For we’re all alone with these notations,
even with Maxwell’s relations.
And oh, what would good old NIST
possibly begin to think about of all this?
But alas, there was nowhere to start
for questions put forth by the heart.
We’re star-crossed lovers, pchem and I,
And I understand why Boltzmann cried.
When asked if I would marry, would I say yes?
I could only yell my reply: VdP plus TdS!
I couldn’t stop, I couldn’t end it,
What’s the use, I cannot mend it!
I am feeling warm, I need a refresher.
What was constant, temperature or pressure?
Oh, the probability density may disappoint,
But I get faint at the thought of the triple point.
And energies, like jewels, they sing to me.
Especially in exponent, divided by kT.
They said, are you hungry? You look faint ‘round the eyes.
I looked up from my work, full of surprise.
I could not eat in all my frustration
when calculating the partition for vibration.
“Electronic, translation, rotation!” I gasped.
Each was more beautiful than the last.
And with gases ideal, I knew what to do.
The free energy was minus kT ln of Q.
I think the spirit of Boltzmann has me possessed
For I spent two weeks deciding which I liked best,
those energies, potential or kinetic.
I think these problems are genetic.
Boltzmann, soon we shall meet,
Hand in hand, Einstein we shall greet.
In the meantime, though, I’ve got just the ticket:
Let’s apply Arrhenius to those hyper crickets.
By: Maria Moutsoglou, entangled
For Dr. Hirko’s spring 2012 graduate statistical mechanics/thermodynamics course.
![scinerds:
Researchers claim quantum breakthrough
Researchers say they have designed a tiny crystal that acts like a quantum computer so powerful it would take a computer the size of the known universe to match it.
Details of the crystal, which is made up of just 300 atoms, are published today in the journal Nature.
“Quantum computing is a kind of information science that is based on the notion that if one performs computations in a fundamentally different way than the way your classical desktop computer works,” says study co-author University of Sydney’s Dr Michael Biercuk.
“There’s a huge potential to solve a variety of problems that are very, very hard or near impossible for standard computer.”
The crystal simulator uses a property of quantum mechanics called superposition, where a quantum particle appears to be in two distinct states at the same time. This means the particle, known as a qubit, can be used to solve two equations simultaneously.
As the number of qubits increase, the number or states increases exponentially. For example, 2 qubits can simultaneously be in 4 states, 3 qubits in 8 states: 2 to the power of n states for n qubits.
[Photo Source: Britton/NIST]
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