Books on Thermal Physics for Undergraduate Physicists

1. P. W. Atkins, The Second Law, W. H. Freeman, 1984.
2. Robert P. Baumann, Modern Thermodynamics with Statistical Mechanics, Macmillan, New York, 1992.
3. Christian von Baeyer, Maxwell's demon: Why warmth disperses and time passes, Modern Library, 1998.
4. Ralph Baierlein, Thermal Physics, Cambridge University Press, New York, 1999.
   A text that I have used in the past for this course
5. Ralph Baierlein, Atoms and Information Theory: An Introduction to Statistical Mechanics, Freeman 1971.
6. Craig F. Bohren and Bruce A. Albrecht. Atmospheric Thermodynamics, Oxford University Press, 1998.
7. Herbert B. Callen, Thermodynamics, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1960.
   I used this in graduate school. Clear presentation of classical thermodynamics. It's better than the second edition. (See below - the second edition has a different title.)
8. H. B. Callen, Thermodynamics and an Introduction to Thermostatistics, John Wiley & Sons 1985.
9. Ashley H. Carter, Classical and Statistical Thermodynamics, Prentice Hall, 2000.
10. D. Chandler, Introduction to Modern Statistical Mechanics, Oxford University Press, 1987.
    A past text for the course by a physical chemist. I will undoubtably make some use of examples from this text.
11. Norman Davidson, Statistical Mechanics, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1962.
    The book I used in graduate school.
12. Paul and Tatiana Ehrenfest, The Conceptual Foundations of the Statistical Approach in Mechanics, Teubner, Leipzig, 1912; reprinted Dover Publication, Mineola, N.Y., 1990.
13. Thomas P. Espinola, Introduction to Thermophysics, Wm. C. Brown, Dubuque, Iowa, 1994.
14. E. Fermi, Thermodynamics, Prentice-Hall, 1937); reprinted by Dover.
15. J. Williard Gibbs, Elementary Principles in Statistical Mechanics, Ox Bow Press. Reprint of original 1902 edition.
16. The Scientific Papers of J. Williard Gibbs, Volume 1: Thermodynamics, Ox Bow Press. Reprint of original 1906 edition.
17. David L. Goodstein, States of Matter, Dover, 1985.
18. Terrel L. Hill, Thermodynamics of Small Systems, W. A. Benjamin, New York, 1963; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1994.
19. Terrel L. Hill, An Introduction to Statistical Thermodynamics, Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts, 1960; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1986.
20. Terrel L. Hill, Statistical Mechanics Principles and Selected Application, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1956; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1987.
21. E. T. Jaynes, Papers on Probability, Statistics and Statistical Physics, Kluwer Academic, edited by R. D. Rosenkrantz.
22. Charles Kittel, Elementary Statistical Physics, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1958; reprinted Krieger, Malabar, Florida, 1988.
    Take the title with a grain of salt - this book is terse and advanced.
23. C. Kittel and H. Kroemer, Thermal Physics, second edition, W. H. Freeman, New York, 1980.
    An excellent book. I have used this to teach the course several times. All students should be familiar with this book. Note should be taken that fundamental entropy and fundamental temperature are used instead of entropy and temperature. Be careful with the Boltzmann factors!
24. L. D. Landau and E. M. Lifshitz, Statistical Physics, Addison-Wesley, 1969.
25. Peter T. Landsbersg, Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics, Oxford University Press, Oxford, England, 1978; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1990.
    A book by one of the grand old men. A pedagogical masterpiece.
26. Harvey S Leff and Andrew F Rex, Maxwell's Demon - Entropy, Information, Computing, Princeton University Press, 1990.
    Everything you need to know about Maxwell's demon.
27. F. Mandl, Statistical Physics, second edition, John Wiley & Sons, 1988.
    I have used this book to teach the course on several occassions. This book emphasizes the statistical approach. I used the first edition of this text as an undergraduate.
28. Philip M. Morse, Thermal Physics, 2nd Ed., Benjamin/Cummings, Reading, Massachusetts, 1969.
29. R. K. Pathria, Statistical Mechanics, second edition, Butterworth-Heinemann, 1996.
30. Max Planck, The theory of Heat Radiation, P. Blakiston, 1914; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1991.
31. Max Planck, Treatise on Thermodynamics, 3rd English Ed., Longmans, London 1926; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1945.
32. Frederick Reif, Fundamentals of Thermal and Statistical Physics, McGraw-Hill, New York, 1965.
    Previously used as the course text. Clear but somewhat wordy.
33. F. Reif, Statistical Physics, (Vol. 5 of Berkeley Physics Course), McGraw-Hill, 1967.
34. Harry S. Robertson, Statistical Thermophysics, Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, 1993.
    A book that I have considered using in the past. Clear, but more advanced than our text.
35. Gilbert S. Rushbrooke, Introduction to Statistical Mechanics, Oxford at the Clarendon Press, Oxford, England, 1949.
    Perhaps my favorite book, long out of print, remarkably clear descriptions of classical statistical mechanics.
36. Erwin Schrodinger, Statistical Thermodynamics, 2nd Ed., Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England, 1952; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1989.
37. Daniel V. Schroeder, An Introduction to Thermal Physics, Addison-Wesley, 2000.
    The text for our course. Most derivations are remarkably complete.
38. H. Eugene Stanley, Introduction to Phase Transitions and Critical Phenomena, 1971, reprinted 1987.
39. Francis W. Sears, Thermodynamics, Kinetic Theory, and Statistical Thermodynamics, 3rd Ed., Addison-Wesley, Reading, Massachusetts, 1975.
    Dry.
40. Arnold Sommerfeld, Thermodynamics and Statistical Mechanics, Academic Press, New York, 1956.
    Contains lots of solved problems.
41. Dirk ter Haar and H. Wergeland, Elements of Thermodynamics, Addison-Wesley, Reading Massachusetts, 1966.
42. Dirk ter Haar, Elements of Statistical Mechanics, 3rd Ed. Butterworth-Heinemann, London 1995.
    Summary by a master of theoretical physics.
43. Chang L. Tien and John H. Lienhard, Statistical Thermodynamics, Revised Printing, Hemisphere, New York, 1979.
44. Richard C. Tolman, The Principles of Statistical Mechanics, Oxford University Press, New York, 1938; reprinted Dover Publication, New York, 1979.
45. J.R. Waldram, The Theory of Thermodynamics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, England, 1985.
46. Gregory H. Wannier, Statistical Physics, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1966; reprinted Dover Publications, New York, 1987.
47. Mark W. Zemansky and Richard H. Dittman, Heat and Thermodynamics, 6th Ed., McGraw-Hill, New York, 1981.

Updated on ... January 23, 2003