Between atoms?

[masonswanson]

DUDE i do not know if this is where im supposed to be at for this but......what is in between the atoms?is it just space?in that case wouldnt there be a pontential vacuum everywhere?

[Queso]

wowzers.

[Tormod]

That was a short membership.

[GAHD]

Just so he knows;

Yes, there is space between atoms.

[sanctus]

And no it was in the wrong place, you should have posted it in physics and mathematics.....

[TINNY]

millions and millions of neutrinos between them...

[sanctus]

In QM you can see the electron as a probability wave, thatmeans that at every permitted orbit you have a certain probability to have an electron localized if you mesure it. The further away you the closer the energy levels get.

Now if I remember right you can apply the same reasoning to atoms, that means the the concept between atoms doesn't really have a meaning, they just have a probability to be somewhere (maybe as well delt-dirac like) but if you do not mesure them thay are sort of everywhere, what would imply that there is nothing in between. But now if you mesure their position then yes you got space between.

[sanctus]

Just a test to see if the title change has worked (due to bad language)

[Tormod]

In general the uncertainty principle applies to everything but it is only noticeable for subatomic particles. Single atoms can now be manipulated so they are directly observable (for example with scanning tunneling microscopy).

 

But there is a semantic problem here. If we ask "is there space between the atoms" and meaning "is there a separation between them" then that would depend on the location of the atoms, so it's not easy to answer. In moledules atoms are tighly bound together.

 

But what is "space"? If the question is "does space consist of atoms" then the answer is no - between single atoms there is only vacuum. This vacuum however has quantum properties and also consists of huge amounts of cosmic radiation (like Tinny pointed out). So whether it is a true vacuum or not is a difficult thing to answer.

[sanctus]

In general the uncertainty principle applies to everything but it is only noticeable for subatomic particles. Single atoms can now be manipulated so they are directly observable (for example with scanning tunneling microscopy).

 

Observing them implies mesuring them (by observing them you define their state).

 

But what is "space"? If the question is "does space consist of atoms" then the answer is no - between single atoms there is only vacuum. This vacuum however has quantum properties and also consists of huge amounts of cosmic radiation (like Tinny pointed out). So whether it is a true vacuum or not is a difficult thing to answer.

 

There is also the thory about Dirac's sea..., but I do not know enough about that yet. What I sort of understood of it is that vacum isn't actually a vacum, just no exitation whcich would create the particle and his anti-particle.

[Tormod]

I'm not saying you're wrong. My point was that atoms are much more complex than electrons. Remember how IBM used single atoms to spell "IBM"? Now what was "between" those atoms which let us see the words spelt out?

 

Look here for an image of that:

http://www.almaden.ibm.com/vis/stm/images/stm10.jpg

 

It was made using an electron force microscope. Of course, the simple answer here is that we only see the letters because the material in between is filtered out but still it's an interesting question.

[sanctus]

Nanotechnology is just stupefying!

[TeleMad]

sanctus: In QM you can see the electron as a probability wave, thatmeans that at every permitted orbit you have a certain probability to have an electron localized if you mesure it. The further away you the closer the energy levels get.

Now if I remember right you can apply the same reasoning to atoms, that means the the concept between atoms doesn't really have a meaning, they just have a probability to be somewhere (maybe as well delt-dirac like) but if you do not mesure them thay are sort of everywhere,…

 

Tormod: In general the uncertainty principle applies to everything but it is only noticeable for subatomic particles.

 

Both of you have valid points, but Tormod's statement is the better.

 

The probability nature brought about by the uncertainty principle does apply even to atoms, but the effects are noticeable, basically, only for subatomic particles.

 

Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle is:

 

[delta]x * [delta]p >= h / (4 * [pi])

 

meaning that the uncertainty in a particle’s position times the uncertainty in the particle’s momentum is always greater than or equal to Planck’s constant divided by 4 times pi.

 

Since it is the uncertainty in position we are interested in, we solve for [delta]x by dividing both sides of the inequality by [delta]p. That gives:

 

[delta]x >= h / [(4 * [pi]) * [delta]p]

 

Momentum is equal to mass times velocity, p = m * v, so substitution gives us:

 

[delta]x >= h / [(4 * [pi]) * [delta]( m * v)]

 

Note that mass, m, is in the denominator on the right-hand side of the inequality. Thus, the uncertainty in position varies indirectly with mass: the greater the mass, the smaller the uncertainty in position. Therefore, although the uncertainty principle does apply to atoms as well as to electrons, the uncertainty in position is much smaller for an atom than for an electron because of the atom’s greater mass.