Could you give me a conceptual example to illustrate the difference between an adiabatic process and an isothermic process? I have read in the text book what each is, but I can't think of a real world example of each process.
A: Isothermal process is one when system temperature is constant (NO TEMPERATURE CHANGE) during the process, for example, when you boil water in a constant-pressure cylinder with piston, temperature does not change but you add heat, so it is not adiabatic. Adiabatic refers to NO HEAT TRANSFER and is irrelevant whether temperature changes or not, for example, if you compress a gas in a thermally insulated cylinder its temperature will increase without any heat added from the surrounding.
