Quantum Mechanics and Split Peas (Electrons and Energy)

While keeping Bohr's ideas in mind, we did a lab to bring more details to Bohr's theories. We took a cup full of split peas and put them in a funnel hovering over a target. We were then to release the peas onto the target and count how many landed in each area that was numbered by the lab sheet. Serena, Kandace, and I did two different runs.

For the first run we put the funnel as high up as we could, therefore increasing the energy. Because the energy was increased so much most of the peas landed in outer areas rather than the inner areas. Our data was:

As you can see not very many peas landed towards the center of the target. Because of the higher level of energy from raising the funnel, most of the peas were forced to outer areas. This is true about electrons too. The higher the level of energy, the more spread out the electron is forced to become.

The second run we did, we lowered the funnel, decreasing the energy and allowing the peas to land more near the center. This data was:

As you can see, when we lowered the funnel, lowering the energy level, the peas were more centered and gathered around the main portion of the target. Electrons that have a lower energy are less spread out than electrons with higher energy.

I learned a lot through this lab. First of all those little plastic split peas really make your hands stink. Secondly, the higher the energy level, the more spread out the electrons, as described by the quantum mechanical model of the atom. The lower the energy level, the closer together and more centered the electrons are.