All Flashcards
What is the effect of an electron transitioning from a higher to a lower energy level?
Emission of a photon with energy equal to the energy difference between the levels.
What is the effect of an atom absorbing a photon with the exact energy difference between two energy levels?
The electron jumps to the higher energy level.
What is the effect of an atom absorbing energy greater than its binding energy?
Ionization: an electron is ejected from the atom, creating an ion.
Cause: An element is heated. What is the effect?
Effect: The element emits light at specific frequencies, creating its emission spectrum.
Cause: White light passes through a cool gas. What is the effect?
Effect: The gas absorbs specific wavelengths, creating dark lines in the spectrum (absorption spectrum).
What happens when an electron in an atom transitions to a lower energy level?
A photon is emitted with energy equal to the energy difference.
Define a photon.
A photon is a discrete packet of light energy.
What is an atom's emission spectrum?
The specific frequencies of light an element emits when its atoms transition from higher to lower energy states.
What is an atom's absorption spectrum?
The specific frequencies of light an element absorbs when its atoms transition from lower to higher energy states.
Define binding energy.
The minimum energy required to remove an electron from an atom.
What is ionization?
The process where an electron is removed from an atom, creating an ion.
Define ground state.
The lowest energy level of an atom.
Compare and contrast emission and absorption spectra.
Emission spectra show bright lines at specific wavelengths when atoms emit photons. Absorption spectra show dark lines at specific wavelengths where atoms absorb photons.
What are the differences between ground state and excited states?
Ground state: lowest energy level, highest binding energy. Excited states: higher energy levels, lower binding energy.
Compare the energy of photons in high-frequency vs. low-frequency light.
High-frequency photons have higher energy; low-frequency photons have lower energy. .
Compare the wavelengths of photons in high-frequency vs. low-frequency light.
High-frequency photons have shorter wavelengths; low-frequency photons have longer wavelengths. .
Compare the binding energy of an electron in ground state with an electron in an excited state.
Ground state electrons have higher binding energy, while excited state electrons have lower binding energy.