Understanding Well Depth and Its Relationship to Bond Energy

[mather]

hello!

what is actually the "well depth" or the "depth of the well" ?

maybe it doesn't help that english is not my native language, but anyway, I can't find some reference

I found the term to be used in context of describing the energy of the bonds

thanks!

 

[Pkruse]

I can't way for sure without knowing the context, but a well is a hole in the ground from which you draw or pump water. But it could mean something else in another context.

 

[marty1]

Sounds like your are talking about the energy well that exist in a tiny region of space surrounded by regions of higher potential energy. A place that a particle gets stuck because it needs kenetic energy to escape. Which is suppose described a hole in the ground as well.

 

[mather]

in Lenard-Jones potential ?

 

[chill_factor]

Pick up a book in quantum mechanics, it will explain everything much better than we can.

 

[Einstein Mcfly]

In a graph of energy versus position, there can be a region of space where the energy is lower than other nearby regions. Graphically, this looks like a hole in the ground and if you want to picture things classically you can think about an electron being a ball trapped in the hole (an electron in a bond, say) that needs some energy put into it to get it out of the hole (break the bond). The deeper the well, the stronger the bond.