written by Todd Timberlake

The EJS Hot and Cold Ideal Gases model simulates the mixing of hot and cold two-dimensional ideal gases in a square box.  This simulation can be used as part of the activity described in "The Statistical Interpretation of Entropy: An Activity" by Todd Timberlake, to be published in The Physics Teacher.

In the model, one gas is initially confined to the left side of the box while the other gas is confined to the right side. An animation window shows the motion of the particles in the box, while an optional graph window plots the temperature of each side of the box, which is determined by measuring the average KE of the particles on each side.  The initial number of particles and temperature on each side of the square can be changed and a button allows the user to reverse the particle velocities at any time.  The user can modify this simulation if EJS is installed locally by right-clicking within the plot and selecting "Open Ejs Model" from the pop-up menu item.

EJS Hot and Cold Ideal Gases model was created using the Easy Java Simulations (EJS) modeling tool.  It is distributed as a ready-to-run (compiled) Java archive.   Double clicking the ejs_entropy_HotAndColdIdealGases.jar file will run the program if  Java is installed.  EJS is a part of the Open Source Physics Project and is designed to make it easier to access, modify, and generate computer models.  Additional EJS models are available.  They can be found by searching ComPADRE for  Open Source Physics, OSP, or EJS.

• Download ejs_entropy_HotAndColdIdealGases.jar - 1370kb Java Archive File

Last Modified June 6, 2014

This file has previous versions.

The source code zip archive contains an XML representation of the EJS Hot and Cold Ideal Gases Model.   Unzip this archive in your EJS workspace to compile and run this model using EJS.

• Download ejs_entropy_HotAndColdIdealGases.zip - 56kb Compressed File

Published July 7, 2010
Last Modified June 6, 2014

This file has previous versions.