Experimental evidence for Hydrogen Wave Function?

[Shenckel]

Hi!

I would like to know if there is any direct experimental evidence of the electron distribution inside of the hydrogen atom. In the Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrogen_atom" you can see the solutions of the Schrödinger equation and the graphical representations of the wave function - but is there any way to verify those electron distributions through experiment? I don't mean the energy levels of the different states - those can be verified through spectroscopy of hydrogen gas, but that only gives the energy differences, and tells me nothing about the spatial distribution of the electrons.

Thanks in advance,

Sebastian.

 

[malawi_glenn]

electric and magnetic moments etc. You can never observe the wave function, only wave function modulus squared.

 

[Entropia]

Hello Sebastian,

Thank you for your question. I can assure you that there is indeed experimental evidence for the hydrogen wave function. The wave function of a hydrogen atom can be experimentally determined through a technique called electron diffraction. This involves passing a beam of electrons through a thin sheet of material and analyzing the resulting diffraction pattern. By comparing the observed pattern to the expected pattern based on the hydrogen wave function, scientists can verify the accuracy of the wave function.

In addition, other experiments such as x-ray diffraction and electron microscopy have also provided evidence for the spatial distribution of electrons in hydrogen atoms. These experiments have been repeated numerous times by different researchers, and the results have consistently confirmed the predicted wave function of hydrogen.

Furthermore, spectroscopy of hydrogen gas not only reveals the energy levels of different states, but also provides information about the probability of finding an electron at a particular energy level, which is directly related to the shape of the wave function.

I hope this helps to answer your question. As scientists, we continuously strive to gather more experimental evidence to support and refine our understanding of the physical world. Thank you for your interest in this topic.