Some Simple Exercises

The Lyman, Balmer, Paschen, and Bracket hydrogen emission series are displayed in the adjacent image (the corresponding absorption series are obtained by reversing all the arrows). The energies for the first several levels of the hydrogen atom are given in the following table.


n Energy (eV)
1 0.00
2 10.20
3 12.09
4 12.75
5 13.06

The energy of a transition is the difference in energies for the initial and final states. Thus, for example, the lowest energy transition in the Balmer series has an energy of 12.0 - 10.2 = 1.8 electron-Volts.

Exercise 1: Warmup
Exercise 2: Balmer Series
Exercise 3: Ionization Limit
Exercise 4: Lyman Series