Heat The "molar heat capacity" is the heat capacity per unit amount (SI unit: mole) of a pure substance, and the "specific heat capacity", often called simply "specific heat", is the heat capacity per unit mass of a material. Heat capacity is a physical property of a substance, which means that it depends on the state and properties of the substance under consideration. The specific heats of monatomic gases, such as helium, are nearly constant with temperature. Diatomic gases such as hydrogen display some temperature dependence, and triatomic gases (e.g., carbon dioxide) still more. Before the development of the laws of
Etymology of electricity coulombs, or should we instead use amperes, joules, or watts, or even volts? Physics texts and reference books supply no solid answer, since physicists have gradually abandoned electricity as a scientific term. And yet Quantity of Electricity still persists in its original definition in many major contemporary references. For example, in the modern SI units of physics, the SI definition of coulomb is given as both the unit quantity of electric charge and also the unit quantity of electricity. Encyclopædia Britannica defines the coulomb as the unit quantity of electricity. The Merriam-Webster dictionary, in definition 1a, defines electricity as charge.