Engineering Physics: Dr. Sandeep Chakraborty
Engineering Physics: Dr. Sandeep Chakraborty
Engineering Physics: Dr. Sandeep Chakraborty
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Module 3: Elements of Quantum Mechanics
Books: There are a plenty!!
On 27th April, 1900 Lord Kelvin gave a lecture at the Royal Institution of Great Britain on:
“Nineteenth-Century Clouds over the Dynamical Theory of Heat and Light”
The two clouds are:
1. The Black-Body emission spectrum: Birth of Quantum Mechanics
2. The results of Michelson-Morley experiment: Birth of Theory of Relativity
Thus Black-Body Radiation occupies a central position in the history of Modern physics
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Need of Quantum Mechanics: Black Body Radiation
Nature of Thermal Radiation
𝒇(𝝀𝑻)
𝒖 𝝀, 𝑻 = (1)
𝝀𝟓
Where the nature of the function „f‟ remained undetermined.
Need of Quantum Mechanics: Black Body Radiation
Black-Body Radiation Laws
Integrating the above equation over λ (0 to infinity), gives, U, the total energy density of
a black body.
In literature this relation is often known as the Wien‟s law.
Wien showed from this relation that the peak value „up‟ of „u‟ and the wavelength „λp‟ at
which this peak occurs, are related to the temperature T of the black body through the
following relations:
(2)
(3)
Equation (2) is famously known as the Wien’s displacement law; and gives the idea of
how the wavelength peak changes with T. [1911 Nobel Prize, Wien]
Need of Quantum Mechanics: Black Body Radiation
Black-Body Radiation Laws
In 1900, Lummer and Pringsheim from their experiments on cavity radiation showed
that both the relations (2) and (3) of Wien agreed well with their results.
They have also found the value of the constants.
From this, Equation (2) can be written as:
Inspired by the kinetic theory of gases, he cooked up through `loose' arguments an ex-
ponential form for the function `f ' and proposed in the same paper of 1896:
At very low temperatures a continuous Wein‟s curve cannot be obtained. Hence Wien‟s
displacement law fails at long wavelengths.