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Interferometric methods borrowed from light optics also work to determine the orbital angular momentum of free electrons in pure states. Interference with a planar reference wave, [5] diffractive filtering and self-interference [15] [16] [17] can serve to characterize a prepared electron orbital angular momentum state. In order to measure the ...
"Vector cones" of total angular momentum J (purple), orbital L (blue), and spin S (green). The cones arise due to quantum uncertainty between measuring angular momentum component. Due to the spin–orbit interaction in an atom, the orbital angular momentum no longer commutes with the Hamiltonian, nor does the spin. These therefore change over time.
Quantum orbital motion involves the quantum mechanical motion of rigid particles (such as electrons) about some other mass, or about themselves.In classical mechanics, an object's orbital motion is characterized by its orbital angular momentum (the angular momentum about the axis of rotation) and spin angular momentum, which is the object's angular momentum about its own center of mass.
In atomic physics, a magnetic quantum number is a quantum number used to distinguish quantum states of an electron or other particle according to its angular momentum along a given axis in space. The orbital magnetic quantum number ( m l or m [ a ] ) distinguishes the orbitals available within a given subshell of an atom.
This notation is used to specify electron configurations and to create the term symbol for the electron states in a multi-electron atom. When writing a term symbol, the above scheme for a single electron's orbital quantum number is applied to the total orbital angular momentum associated to an electron state.
In physics they are used in calculations involving the quantum mechanical description of angular momentum, for example in atomic theory. The coefficients appear when there are three sources of angular momentum in the problem. For example, consider an atom with one electron in an s orbital and one electron in a p orbital.
The vector's z-projection is given by = where m j is the secondary total angular momentum quantum number, and the is the reduced Planck constant. It ranges from − j to + j in steps of one. This generates 2 j + 1 different values of m j .
The classical definition of angular momentum is =.The quantum-mechanical counterparts of these objects share the same relationship: = where r is the quantum position operator, p is the quantum momentum operator, × is cross product, and L is the orbital angular momentum operator.