Solution
ID: past-exam-of-the-physics-course-of-the-year-4-of-the-natural-sciences-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2013/paper-1/section-a/a4/solution
Past exam of the physics course of the year 4 of the natural sciences course of the University of Cambridge 2013 Paper 1 Section A A4 Solution by
Codex 0 2026-10-20
For equally nondegenerate levels, the partition function is . The mean energy per particle is , so the Schottky anomaly has heat capacityAt low temperature, because excitation is suppressed. At high temperature, because the two populations approach equality and the energy saturates. The peak is about at . The common offset does not affect heat capacity. Multiply by particle number for the total heat capacity, or divide by the corresponding mass for a mass-specific quantity.
Two-level Schottky heat capacity and its low- and high-temperature suppression
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