Conclusion on hydrogen spectrum
Answers
Explanation:
The photoelectric effect provided indisputable evidence for the existence of the photon and thus the particle-like behavior of electromagnetic radiation. The concept of the photon, however, emerged from experimentation with thermal radiation, electromagnetic radiation emitted as the result of a source’s temperature, which produces a continuous spectrum of energies. More direct evidence was needed to verify the quantized nature of electromagnetic radiation. In this section, we describe how experimentation with visible light provided this evidence.
Line Spectra
Although objects at high temperature emit a continuous spectrum of electromagnetic radiation (Figure 6.2.2), a different kind of spectrum is observed when pure samples of individual elements are heated. For example, when a high-voltage electrical discharge is passed through a sample of hydrogen gas at low pressure, the resulting individual isolated hydrogen atoms caused by the dissociation of H2 emit a red light. Unlike blackbody radiation, the color of the light emitted by the hydrogen atoms does not depend greatly on the temperature of the gas in the tube. When the emitted light is passed through a prism, only a few narrow lines, called a line spectrum, which is a spectrum in which light of only a certain wavelength is emitted or absorbed, rather than a continuous range of wavelengths (Figure 7.3.1), rather than a continuous range of colors. The light emitted by hydrogen atoms is red because, of its four characteristic lines, the most intense line in its spectrum is in the red portion of the visible spectrum, at 656 nm. With sodium, however, we observe a yellow color because the most intense lines in its spectrum are in the yellow portion of the spectrum, at about 589 nm.
Figure 7.3.1: The Emission of Light by Hydrogen Atoms. (a) A sample of excited hydrogen atoms emits a characteristic red light. (b) When the light emitted by a sample of excited hydrogen atoms is split into its component wavelengths by a prism, four characteristic violet, blue, green, and red emission lines can be observed, the most intense of which is at 656 nm.
Such emission spectra were observed for many other elements in the late 19th century, which presented a major challenge because classical physics was unable to explain them. Part of the explanation is provided by Planck’s equation (Equation 2..2.1): the observation of only a few values of λ (or ν) in the line spectrum meant that only a few values of E were possible. Thus the energy levels of a hydrogen atom had to be quantized; in other words, only states that had certain values of energy were possible, or allowed. If a hydrogen atom could have any value of energy, then a continuous spectrum would have been observed, similar to blackbody radiation.