Heisenberg or why the electrons don't fall in the nucleus

[BSG CORP]

Heisenberg or why the electrons don't fall in the nucleus
According to the classical Physics , electrons, being attracted by the nucleus of the atom, should fall inside it and so all matter should collapse. Heisenberg was the first to explain why this doesn't happen and the matter is solid. The answer was in his famous indetermination principle that can be "explained" in this way. The electrons have a kind of "vibration" that increases as we force them in a smaller space and the nucleus is so small that there is no way to force them there unless we use a very big force. It is as if we have a few people around in a room : they will move around doing something. If the room get smaller the same people will move more and more and this creates a kind of pression that forbids at some point to the room to became smaller.This jitter

[orbsycli]

This jitter, indeed.

[von Faulkenstein]

Since we now follow Schrodinger's model of the atom, could the electon's quantized energy levels prevent such a collapse because this would voilate this quantization or the Uncertainty Relation? If the electron were to "fall" inside the nucleus, one could determine its position and momentum at the same time (this is not permitted). Still the electron does have a slight probability of being in the nucleus at times--but never 100%.

[InfiniteNow]

Too bad this, like all of his other posts, are stolen from other sites without proper credit being attributed:

Science myths

[von Faulkenstein]

A jittery electron is close to a fuzzy one--anyway, they all look alike. Any better ideas?

Regards,
Doc

[Mohit Pandey]

Originally Posted by InfiniteNow

Too bad this, like all of his other posts, are stolen from other sites without proper credit being attributed:

Science myths

How did you find it?

[HydrogenBond]

If you look at a free electron, it is a charge in motion, which means it will generate a magnetic field. Although an electron moving toward a nucleus would lower its charge potential, this does not offer the best way for the electron's magnetic field to lower its potential. As it accelerates toward the nucleus the magnetic field gets stronger as the charge potential lowers. If the electron orbits, it does a better job of minimizing its own magnetic field via wave additions creates as modeled by the wave functions. If the electron could slow where its magnetic contribution was lower that its charge contribution, then going into the nucleus would offer better energetics.

For example, if you look at oxide or O-2, this ion allows more negative charge than positive charge to exist within a semi-stable situation. The favorable addition of all the electron magnetic fields, canceling, give off more energy than the potential created by the opposing charge repulsion. Not falling into the atom gives the best combination of EM potential for the electron.

[von Faulkenstein]

Your addition, HydrogenBond has added a new dimension. Even before I started teaching physics, the electron was still thought of as a small body in circular motion around the "sun" or nucleus--this was 50 years ago. Thanks.
Regards,
Doc N

[Farsight]

If I can express it another way: when people wonder why the electron doesn't fall into the nucleus, they're thinking in terms of point particles. Consider the simplest atom, hydrogen. Here we've got one electron and one proton. If you think in terms of "billiard ball" points you start scratching your head wondering why they don't attract one another ad infinitum and turn into some little black-hole-type nugget that you can never separate. It just isn't like that. The electron isn't some solid particle. Have you ever played with magnets and felt the repulsion? That's a magnetic field. An electron is something like that. It's like the field without the magnet, and it's electromagnetic rather than magnetic. It has a spatial extent, a size. So does the proton, and it's smaller. It's a different shape too, but that's by the by. The bottom line reason why the electron can't fall in is that it's too big.

[Qfwfq]

Originally Posted by Farsight

It has a spatial extent, a size. So does the proton, and it's smaller.

This is refuted by experimental data. The distribution of position of a particle should not be confused with the notion of size.