Electric field energy

[jmb741]

cant solve this problem please help.

1a) The hydrogen atom has a single electron in a fixed orbit around the proton with a radius of (5.29 E-11 m). Find the total electric field energy U(E) for the electron and proton assumming that each one has a radius of (1.00E-15 m).

1b) Included the additional contribution to the electrical potential energy U'(E) if we consider the charge within the proton as a uniform charge distribution.

 

[OlderDan]

Electric field energy density is

$$u=e_0E^2/2$$

The numbers give you the separation of the charges, and I assume the radii are to be used to treat the charge as distributed over the surface in part a) and then uniformly distributed for the proton in part b)

You might get something helpful reading a couple of pages here.

http://www.phys.ufl.edu/~rfield/classes/spring01/images/chp31_3.pdf
http://www.phys.ufl.edu/~rfield/classes/spring01/images/chp31_4.pdf
http://www.physics.gla.ac.uk/~dland/ELMAG305/Elmag305txt3.pdf [Broken]