Question

One mole of oxygen is allowed to expand isothermally and reversibly from 5 metre cube to 10 m cube at 300k calculate the workdone of the gas

Answer 1

Work done in an isothermal reversible process is given by the equation,

-2.303nRTlog(P1/P2) where

n is number of moles

R=8.314J/mol.K

T is temperature

P1,P2 are initial and final pressures.

By substituting, we get

-2.303*5*8.314*300*log(10/2)

-2.303*5*8.314*300*log5 = 20074.91 J

Work done is lifting a mass to a height h is given by m*g*h

So equate them both to get maximum mass that can be lifted.

m*9.8*1m = 20074.91

m= 2048.46 kg.