Time-averaged position of the electron

[rkolesni]

If you would sit at the nucleus of the hydrogen atom and observe a 1s electron, you wouldn’t see it moving in a continuous trajectory, like a planet around a sun. Instead, imagine you can only locate the electron by taking a picture of your surroundings, and determining from it where the electron was at the moment the picture was taken. Now imagine you can put a little puff of mist at that position. If you repeat this many-many times, you’ll find yourself surrounded by a spherical cloud of mist, and if you’ll start moving away from the nucleus, you’ll notice that the density of that cloud changes. Now, at each point at the cloud, the denser the mist, the higher chance there is for the electron to be found there at any given time.

[Author]

Posts