phonons!

[nibot]

The energy of a lattice vibration is quantized. The quantum energy is called a phonon in analogy with the photon of the electromagnetic wave. Elastic waves in crystals are made up of phonons. Thermal vibrations in crystals are thermally excited phonons, like the thermally excited photons of black-body electromagnetic radiation in a cavity. The energy of an elastic mode of angular frequency ω is ε=(n+1/2)ℏω when the mode is occupied by n phonons.

Solid state physics is a lot more interesting than I'd thought! (Then they go on to talk about plasmons, magnons, polarons, and excitons...) Even planck's constant shows up!

Comments

[ragnus.livejournal.com]

heh

which physics class is this?

[transplantgn.livejournal.com]

as much as I wanna know what that mean and I actually do I went crosseeyed reading that abotu 4 times.

emma is curious because emma is a physics groupie...

[emidala.livejournal.com]

tobin, what kind of physics have you been doing before?

[shamster.livejournal.com]

Shouldn't the angular quantum number (nu) be used instead of n? Or do you not care for nomenclatural preservation?

Also, what's the advantage in defining vibrations as phonons instead of just saying 'vibrations'. And... What's meant by a "thermal" vibration?

What's the special part about planck's const.?

disgruntled south african

[pixieza.livejournal.com]

nah,

solid state physics is BORING!
argument:
1. half the department in cape town does solid state physics
2. they are all weird and boring
-> solid state physics is boring.

I find those phonon things really weird - they almost seem like the vibrational energy people felt left out without having exciting new particles so they invented them.

[tjernobyl.livejournal.com]

Also, phonon!