Chapter 5: Q84CE (page 193)
Determine the expectation value of the momentum of the particle. Explain.
Short Answer
The expected value of momentum is .
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Chapter 5: Q84CE (page 193)
Determine the expectation value of the momentum of the particle. Explain.
The expected value of momentum is .
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In Section 5.5, it was shown that the infinite well energies follow simply from the formula for kinetic energy, p2/2m; and a famous standing-wave condition, . The arguments are perfectly valid when the potential energy is 0(inside the well) and L is strictly constant, but they can also be useful in other cases. The length L allowed the wave should be roughly the distance between the classical turning points, where there is no kinetic energy left. Apply these arguments to the oscillator potential energy, .Find the location x of the classical turning point in terms of E; use twice this distance for L; then insert this into the infinite well energy formula, so that appears on both sides. Thus far, the procedure really only deals with kinetic energy. Assume, as is true for a classical oscillator, that there is as much potential energy, on average, as kinetic energy. What do you obtain for the quantized energies?
To determine the energy quantization condition
Consider the wave function that is a combination of two different infinite well stationary states the and the
Outline a procedure for predicting how the quantum-mechanically allowed energies for a harmonic oscillator should depend on a quantum number. In essence, allowed kinetic energies are the particle-in-a box energies, except the length Lis replaced by the distance between classical tuning points. Expressed in terms of E. Apply this procedure to a potential energy of the form U(x) = - b/x where b is a constant. Assume that at the origin there is an infinitely high wall, making it one turning point, and determine the other numing point in terms of E. For the average potential energy, use its value at half way between the tuning points. Again in terms of E. Find and expression for the allowed energies in terms of m, b, and n. (Although three dimensional, the hydrogen atom potential energy is of this form. and the allowed energy levels depend on a quantum number exactly as this simple model predicts.)
For a total energy of 0, the potential energy is given in Exercise 96. (a) Given these, to what region of the x-axis would a classical particle be restricted? Is the quantum-mechanical particle similarly restricted? (b) Write an expression for the probability that the (quantum-mechanical) particle would be found in the classically forbidden region, leaving it in the form of an integral. (The integral cannot be evaluated in closed form.)
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