disgregation

1. (thermodynamics, obsolete or historical) A measure of the separation of the particles of a system; an early formulation of entropy.Examples: "1868, R. Clausius, On the Second Fundamental Theorem of the Mechanical Theory of Heat, [1867, Lecture to the German Scientific Association], The London, Edinburgh, and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science, page 408, The disgregation of a body is consequently, among the three states of aggregation, least in the solid state, greater in the liquid state, and greatest of all in the gaseous state. In the last condition it can still be increased by the molecules separating further from each other—that is, by the gas expanding to a larger volume. In like manner, the decomposition of a chemically compound body into its elements is in general accompanied by an increase of disgregation. By help of this conception the effect of heat can be simply expressed by saying that heat tends to increase the disgregation of bodies."; "The gas, however, may experience the same changes of volume and disgregation in another manner."; "Since the increase of disgregation is the action by means of which heat performs work, it follows that the quantity of work must bear a definite ratio to the quantity by which the disgregation is increased; we will therefore fix the still arbitrary determination of the magnitude of disgregation so that, at any given temperature, the increase of disgregation shall be proportional to the work which the heat can thereby perform."countablehistoricalobsoleteuncountable