Resumo em inglês The classical interpretations of Nicolas Léonard Sadi Carnot on some physical principles involved in the operation of heat engines were fundamental to the development and formulation of the Second Law of Thermodynamics. Moreover, an accurate historical survey clearly reveals that Carnot was, by that time, also well aware about some new concepts, which were further worked out by other scientists to lead to what was, some time later, known as the mechanical equivalent of h (mais) eat and the conservation of energy. Benoit Paul Émile Clapeyron recognized these original concepts in the first of Carnot´s monographs, published in 1824, but no explicit citation is found in any post-Carnot classical texts dealing with the First Law of Thermodynamics, including those by Julius Robert Mayer, James Prescott Joule and Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand von Helmholtz. The main objective of the present work is to point out some historical evidences of the pioneering contribution of Carnot to the modern concept of the First Law of Thermodynamics.
Resumo em português A idéia central desse artigo é chamar a atenção para o uso do diagrama T x s na descrição das máquinas térmicas reversíveis. Este diagrama mostra-se extremamente adequado e eficaz no ensino da segunda lei da tertermodinâmica dos processos reversíveis, no entanto uma escolha mostra-se mais apropriada que a outra quando se pretende salientar a universalidade dessa lei e não restringir a análise a uma substância de operação específica com é gás ideal. Resumo em inglês The central idea of this article is to call attention for the use of the T x S diagram in the description of reversible heat engines. This diagram is an extremely suitable and efficient way for teaching the second law of thermodynamics, following the Kelvin formulation. The conjugated pairs (PV) or (TS) are equivalent in the description of the reversible thermodynamic processes, however one choice is more appropriate than the other when one intends to point out the universality of this law and not to restrict the analysis to a specific operating substance like the ideal gas.