Symbol L. The quantity of heat absorbed or released when a substance changes its physical phase at constant temperature (e.g. from solid to liquid at the melting point or from liquid to gas at the boiling point). For example, the latent heat of vaporization is the energy a substance absorbs from its surroundings in order to overcome the attractive forces between its molecules as it changes from a liquid to a gas and in order to do work against the external atmosphere as it expands. In thermodynamic terms the latent heat is the enthalpy of evaporation (ΔH), i.e. L=ΔH=ΔU+pΔV, where ΔU is the change in the internal energy, p is the pressure, and ΔV is the change in volume.
The specific latent heat (symbol l) is the heat absorbed or released per unit mass of a substance in the course of its isothermal change of phase. The molar latent heat is the heat absorbed or released per unit amount of substance during an isothermal change of state.