- #1
- 372
- 0
Is it possible to find the energy of an electron of a particular element in a particular orbit?
Is it possible to find the energy of an electron of a particular element in a particular orbit?
It is the difference between the energy levels of the atom. For example, an electron in hydrogen in the ground state (n=1) has an binding energy of -13.6eV. The binding energy at n=2 is -3.4eV, hence for an electron transition from n=1 to n=2 the electron must 'absorb' a photon of energy E = |-13.6 + 3.4 | = 10.2eV. This energy corresponds to the wavelength of a photon in the UV range. Equally, when an electron becomes 'de-excited' i.e. transitions from n=2 to n=1 the electron will emit a photon of the same corresponding energy and hence wavelength. The process becomes a little more complicated if you start looking at the hyperfine structure of hydrogen or other elements in general (as cristo said).What about the energy need for an electron of hydrogen to jump to another orbital?Say when a photon hits it?
Actually, Hydrogen does have spectral lines in the visible range, take a transition from n=3 to n=2 for example; this correspond to an energy of about 1.9eV which results in a wavelength of about 656nm which is in visible [red] light. There are more transitions which occur at the violet end of the spectrum. The energy of IR radiation also 'happens' to correspond to the energies separating the quantum states of molecular vibrations (which results in temperature), its not only atoms and electrons that have quantum states...Thanks a lot for the explanation.This might be able to explain why hydrogen is colourless.As Hootenanny said,ultraviolet rays are emitted by an excited hydrogen electron.hence we cannot see it.Is that correct?
Also i have another doubt regarding hoot's explanation.If an infrared photon strikes an electron why is heat produced?The energy of the photon is so low that as u said it shouldn't interact with the electron or should have very low probability of interacting