Energy & Green Tech
Sodium-ion batteries are a potential replacement for lithium batteries, but the anodes—positively charged electrodes—that work well for lithium-ion batteries don't provide the same level of performance for sodium-ion ...
Jan 12, 2021
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93
Electronics & Semiconductors
Researchers at Osaka University demonstrated a new technique for modifying the hydrogen concentration of resistors by applying an electrical voltage. The generated electric field drove the diffusion of hydrogen ions deeper ...
Dec 9, 2020
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8
Energy & Green Tech
Physicists from the University of Luxembourg with European experts have succeeded in explaining the recent efficiency improvements in thin film solar cells. The work of the whole consortium has been published in the prestigious ...
Feb 4, 2020
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5
Machine learning & AI
There are countless computer algorithms that simulate biological behavior from leaping frogs, to bat foraging, from cuckoo search to ant colony optimization. They all have something in common, the algorithm behaves like a ...
Dec 19, 2019
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Engineering
Inspired by a University of Michigan professor's recovery after a cycling crash, an innovative patch could bring the assessment of human joints into the 21st century.
Oct 16, 2019
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159
Engineering
3-D printing has become an increasingly important production method. Researchers at ETH have now developed a new 3-D printing technique by which micrometre-sized objects made of several metals can be produced with high spatial ...
Apr 30, 2019
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253
In atomic physics and quantum chemistry, electron configuration is the arrangement of electrons of an atom, a molecule, or other physical structure. It concerns the way electrons can be distributed in the orbitals of the given system (atomic or molecular for instance).
Like other elementary particles, the electron is subject to the laws of quantum mechanics, and exhibits both particle-like and wave-like nature. Formally, the quantum state of a particular electron is defined by its wave function, a complex-valued function of space and time. According to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics, the position of a particular electron is not well defined until an act of measurement causes it to be detected. The probability that the act of measurement will detect the electron at a particular point in space is proportional to the square of the absolute value of the wavefunction at that point.
An energy is associated to each electron configuration and, upon certain conditions, electrons are able to move from one orbital to another by emission or absorption of a quantum of energy, in the form of a photon.
Knowledge of the electron configuration of different atoms is useful in understanding the structure of the periodic table of elements. The concept is also useful for describing the chemical bonds that hold atoms together. In bulk materials this same idea helps explain the peculiar properties of lasers and semiconductors.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
