Entropy (disambiguation)

Last updated February 17, 2025

Entropy is a scientific concept that is most commonly associated with a state of disorder, randomness, or uncertainty.

Science and technology

Entropy (classical thermodynamics), thermodynamic entropy in macroscopic terms, with less emphasis on the statistical explanation
Entropy (statistical thermodynamics), the statistical explanation of thermodynamic entropy based on probability theory
- Configuration entropy, the entropy change due to a change in the knowledge of the position of particles, rather than their momentum
- Conformational entropy, the entropy change due to a change in the "configuration" of a particle (e.g. a right-handed vs. a left-handed polyatomic molecule)
Tsallis entropy, a generalization of Boltzmann-Gibbs entropy
von Neumann entropy, entropy in quantum statistical physics and quantum information science
Entropy (order and disorder), the relationship of disorder with heat and work
Entropy in thermodynamics and information theory, the relationship between thermodynamic entropy and information (Shannon) entropy
Entropy (energy dispersal), dispersal of energy as a descriptor of entropy
Entropy (astrophysics), the adiabatic constant

Entropy (information theory), also called Shannon entropy, a measure of the unpredictability or information content of a message source
Differential entropy, a generalization of Entropy (information theory) to continuous random variables
- Entropy of entanglement, related to the Shannon and von Neumann entropies for entangled systems; reflecting the degree of entanglement of subsystems
Algorithmic entropy an (incomputable) measure of the information content of a particular message
Rényi entropy, a family of diversity measures generalising Shannon entropy; used to define fractal dimensions
Topological entropy, a measure of exponential growth in dynamical systems; equivalent to the rate of increase of α->0 Renyi entropy of a trajectory in trajectory-space
Volume entropy, a Riemannian invariant measuring the exponential rate of volume growth of a Riemannian metric
Graph entropy, a measure of the information rate achievable by communicating symbols over a channel in which certain pairs of values may be confused

Entropy encoding, data compression strategies to produce a code length equal to the entropy of a message
Entropy (computing), an indicator of the number of random bits available to seed cryptography systems
Entropy (anesthesiology), a measure of a patient's cortical function, based on the mathematical entropy of EEG signals
Entropy (ecology), measures of biodiversity in the study of biological ecology, based on Shannon and Rényi entropies
Social entropy, a measure of the natural decay within a social system

Entropy (board game)
Entropy (video game)
Entropy or Alchemiss, a character in Freedom Force vs the 3rd Reich
N. Tropy, a character from Crash Bandicoot: Warped
Entropy: Zero, a Source mod for Half-Life 2 released in 2017 developed by Breadman
Entropy: Zero 2 , a sequel to Entropy: Zero released in 2022
Entropy: Zero - Uprising, a mod of Entropy: Zero developed by Employee8 and Filipad

Entropy (choreography), the difference between a transcription and a performance

Entropy (package manager), a Sabayon Linux package manager
Information entropy, relating to disruptive actions taken in Internet vigilantism