Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-atomic-and-laser-physics-course-of-the-university-of-oxford/2021/4/e/solution
Past exam of the atomic and laser physics course of the University of Oxford 2021 4 e Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-25
Put . Gauss's law for a uniform spherical nuclear charge distribution, with the electrostatic potential matched at , gives the electronic potential energySubtracting the point-nucleus Coulomb potential leaves the nonnegative perturbationThe normalized nonrelativistic hydrogen-like ion wavefunction has . Since , approximate it inside the atomic nucleus by . First-order time-independent perturbation theory then givesDefine , as the paper specifies for the hydrogen-like ion, rather than the neutral-hydrogen value. Using givesto leading order in . For , , , andThe finite nuclear charge radius makes the energy level less bound. The quoted frequency is a level shift divided by : a line frequency shifts by , so a decay into this shifted level alone has the opposite sign.
The formula is a nonrelativistic, small-nuclear charge radius estimate. Keeping the exponential in the first-order integral gives , about a one-percent correction here. More seriously, for lead, so relativistic contraction is substantial. A precise physical prediction needs a finite-nucleus Dirac equation calculation; the boxed estimate is the model requested, not precision heavy-ion spectroscopy.
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