Curvature as a Measure of the Thermodynamic Interaction

Abstract

We present a systematic and consistent construction of geometrothermodynamics by using Riemannian contact geometry for the phase manifold and harmonic maps for the equilibrium manifold. We present several metrics for the phase manifold that are invariant with respect to Legendre transformations and induce thermodynamic metrics on the equilibrium manifold. We review all the known examples in which the curvature of the thermodynamic metrics can be used as a measure of the thermodynamic interaction.