Arkansas Physics


Colloquium
4 p.m.
Oct. 30 2009
Paul Sharrah Lecture Hall (Room 133)
Physics Building

Otto “Bud” Zinke
Emeritus Faculty
Physics Dept.
University of Arkansas

The Thomson Effect is Old and Well Known

The Onsager-Callen formulation predicting the behavior of thermocouple systems is the principle basis for the theory of non-equilibrium thermodynamics. As it developed in my laboratory at the University of Arkansas, paradoxically, we do not understand the thermocouple system, and what we do know contradicts both William Thomson (Lord Kelvin) and the Onsager-Callen theory.