Question

Specific heat of an adsorbed mobile monolayer.

If the surface of some solid is maintained in a reasonably good vacuum, a single layer of molecules, one molecular diameter thick, can form on this surface. (The molecules are then said to be adsorbed on the surface.) The molecules are held to this surface by forces exerted on them by the atoms of the solid, but they may be quite free to move in two dimensions on this surface. They form then, to good approximation, a classical two-dimensional gas. If the molecules are monatomic and the absolute temperature is T, what is the specific heat per mole of molecules thus adsorbed on a surface of fixed size?

Answer 1