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Nevertheless, the Bohr radius formula remains central in atomic physics calculations, due to its simple relationship with fundamental constants (this is why it is defined using the true electron mass rather than the reduced mass, as mentioned above). As such, it became the unit of length in atomic units. In Schrödinger's quantum-mechanical ...
One difference between the Gaussian and SI systems is in the factor 4π in various formulas that relate the quantities that they define. With SI electromagnetic units, called rationalized, [3] [4] Maxwell's equations have no explicit factors of 4π in the formulae, whereas the inverse-square force laws – Coulomb's law and the Biot–Savart law – do have a factor of 4π attached to the r 2.
The radius is then defined to be the classical electron radius, , and one arrives at the expression given above. Note that this derivation does not say that is the actual radius of an electron. It only establishes a dimensional link between electrostatic self energy and the mass–energy scale of the electron.
The two ratios of three characteristic lengths: the classical electron radius r e, the reduced Compton wavelength of the electron ƛ e, and the Bohr radius a 0: r e = αƛ e = α 2 a 0. In quantum electrodynamics, α is directly related to the coupling constant determining the strength of the interaction between electrons and photons. [18]
Atomic units are chosen to reflect the properties of electrons in atoms, which is particularly clear in the classical Bohr model of the hydrogen atom for the bound electron in its ground state: Mass = 1 a.u. of mass; Charge = −1 a.u. of charge; Orbital radius = 1 a.u. of length; Orbital velocity = 1 a.u. of velocity [44]: 597
In the CGS-ESU system, charge q is therefore has the dimension to M 1/2 L 3/2 T −1. Other units in the CGS-ESU system include the statampere (1 statC/s) and statvolt (1 erg/statC). In CGS-ESU, all electric and magnetic quantities are dimensionally expressible in terms of length, mass, and time, and none has an independent dimension.
For more recent data on covalent radii see Covalent radius. Just as atomic units are given in terms of the atomic mass unit (approximately the proton mass), the physically appropriate unit of length here is the Bohr radius, which is the radius of a hydrogen atom. The Bohr radius is consequently known as the "atomic unit of length".
The last expression in the first equation shows that the wavelength of light needed to ionize a hydrogen atom is 4π/α times the Bohr radius of the atom. The second equation is relevant because its value is the coefficient for the energy of the atomic orbitals of a hydrogen atom: E n = − h c R ∞ / n 2 {\displaystyle E_{n}=-hcR_{\infty }/n ...