Question

Aline in the spectrum of atomic mercury has wave length of 254nm when mercury emits a photon of light at this wave length. What is the frequency of the light?

Answer 1

To find the frequency of light emitted by atomic mercury with a wavelength of 254 nm, we can use the formula:

$c=\lambda \cdot \nu$

where: $c$ is the speed of light in a vacuum (approximately $2.998\times 10^8$ m/s), $\lambda$ is the wavelength in meters, and $\nu$ is the frequency in Hz.

First, we need to convert the wavelength from nanometers (nm) to meters (m):

$\lambda =254\text{nm}\times 10^{-9}\text{m/nm}=2.54\times 10^{-7}\text{m}$

Now we can rearrange the formula to solve for the frequency:

$\nu =\frac{c}{\lambda }$

Plugging in the values:

$\nu =\frac{2.998\times 10^8\text{m/s}}{2.54\times 10^{-7}\text{m}}$