Paper 2, Section II, A

Quantum Mechanics | Part IB, 2014

For an electron of mass mm in a hydrogen atom, the time-independent Schrödinger equation may be written as

22mr2r(r2ψr)+12mr2L2ψe24πϵ0rψ=Eψ-\frac{\hbar^{2}}{2 m r^{2}} \frac{\partial}{\partial r}\left(r^{2} \frac{\partial \psi}{\partial r}\right)+\frac{1}{2 m r^{2}} L^{2} \psi-\frac{e^{2}}{4 \pi \epsilon_{0} r} \psi=E \psi

Consider normalised energy eigenstates of the form

ψlm(r,θ,ϕ)=R(r)Ylm(θ,ϕ)\psi_{l m}(r, \theta, \phi)=R(r) Y_{l m}(\theta, \phi)

where YlmY_{l m} are orbital angular momentum eigenstates:

L2Ylm=2l(l+1)Ylm,L3Ylm=mYlmL^{2} Y_{l m}=\hbar^{2} l(l+1) Y_{l m}, \quad L_{3} Y_{l m}=\hbar m Y_{l m}

where l=1,2,l=1,2, \ldots and m=0,±1,±2,±lm=0, \pm 1, \pm 2, \ldots \pm l. The YlmY_{l m} functions are normalised with θ=0πϕ=02πYlm2sinθdθdϕ=1.\int_{\theta=0}^{\pi} \int_{\phi=0}^{2 \pi}\left|Y_{l m}\right|^{2} \sin \theta d \theta d \phi=1 .

(i) Write down the resulting equation satisfied by R(r)R(r), for fixed ll. Show that it has solutions of the form

R(r)=Arlexp(ra(l+1))R(r)=A r^{l} \exp \left(-\frac{r}{a(l+1)}\right)

where aa is a constant which you should determine. Show that

E=e2Dπϵ0aE=-\frac{e^{2}}{D \pi \epsilon_{0} a}

where DD is an integer which you should find (in terms of ll ). Also, show that

A2=22l+3aFG!(l+1)H,|A|^{2}=\frac{2^{2 l+3}}{a^{F} G !(l+1)^{H}},

where F,GF, G and HH are integers that you should find in terms of ll.

(ii) Given the radius of the proton rpar_{p} \ll a, show that the probability of the electron being found within the proton is approximately

22l+3C(rpa)2l+3[1+O(rpa)]\frac{2^{2 l+3}}{C}\left(\frac{r_{p}}{a}\right)^{2 l+3}\left[1+\mathcal{O}\left(\frac{r_{p}}{a}\right)\right]

finding the integer CC in terms of ll.

[You may assume that 0tletdt=l!\int_{0}^{\infty} t^{l} e^{-t} d t=l !.]

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