Is there something like a maximum temperature?

We all know, that the lowest possible temperature is reached at -273,15 °C, where the atoms no longer show movement due to cinetic energy, but instead only due to quantum mechanical effects.

Now I wonder, if there is also something like a highest possible temperature.

Light speed in every medium is lower than light speed in vacuum. You can however accelerate particles in a medium to a higher speed as light speed in that same medium, which then leads to Cherenkow radiation, that soon gets rid of the energy until the speed of the particles is again slower than light speed.

So in order to maintain very high temperatures you would have to continuosly add the energy that is lost due to Cherenkow radiation. But again I think, this transport of new energy into the system will be limited, so that in the end there will be a balance between the energy you are able to continously add the energy loss from Cherenkow radiation. At that point a maximum temperature would be reached.

On the other hand, at very high temperature the particles would be even faster as in current particle colliders, so that every collision between them would create a lot of other particles, that are themselves all slower than the colliding particles.

Now I know no details about thermo dynamics and even less about what matter looks like at high temperatures. (I know it will become ionized, but will it also fall apart into quarks?)

Is there anybody who can enlighten me on the topic?

cu

Perhaps Cecil himself.

Damn, I had the feeling that I forgot something when I pressed submit. I settled for the missing “and” in my text, but know I realize I forgot to search the archive first.

Thanks for pointing my nose at it.

cu

It’s way more complicated than you’d think. From this article:

Thanks, very interesting article and comprehensible even to me.

cu