Turbomachinery
machines that transfer energy between a rotor and a fluid
Turbomachinery, in mechanical engineering, describes machines that transfer energy between a rotor and a fluid, including both turbines and compressors. While a turbine transfers energy from a fluid to a rotor, a compressor transfers energy from a rotor to a fluid. It is an important application of fluid mechanics.
These two types of machines are governed by the same basic relationships including Newton's second law of motion and Euler's pump and turbine equation for compressible fluids. Centrifugal pumps are also turbomachines that transfer energy from a rotor to a fluid, usually a liquid, while turbines and compressors usually work with a gas.
History
The first turbomachines could be identified as water wheels, which appeared between the 3rd and 1st centuries BCE in the Mediterranean region. These were used throughout the medieval period and began the first Industrial Revolution. When steam power started to be used, as the first power source driven by the combustion of a fuel rather than renewable natural power sources, this was as reciprocating engines. Primitive turbines and conceptual designs for them, such as the smoke jack, appeared intermittently but the temperatures and pressures required for a practically efficient turbine exceeded the manufacturing technology of the time. The first patent for gas turbines were filed in 1791 by John Barber.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q63973. The Library of Congress control number is sh85138741. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1791.
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This entry incorporates text from “Turbomachinery” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.