CHEM 35 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Reduced Mass, Diatomic Molecule, Particle System
9 Dec 2022
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Consider the rotation of two particles at a fixed distance r from one another: Com r2 m2 r + r r. These two particles could be an electron and a proton (in which case we"d be looking at a hydrogen atom) or two nuclei (in which case we"d be looking at a diatomic molecule. Classically, each of these rotating bodies has an angular momentum l = i where is the angular velocity and ii is the moment of inertia ii = mr i have the same angular frequency. Note that, in the com, the two bodies must i i. 2 = m r 2 2 + m r 2 2 = Instead of thinking of this as two rotating particles, it would be really nice if we could think of it as one effective particle rotating around the origin. We can do this if we define the effective moment of inertia as:
