# Calculate the de Broglie wavelength associated with a muon traveling at a velocity of 8.85×10^5 cm/s?

HELP

i literally have no idea what this is.

Relevance
• 9 years ago

In order to do this, you must first know the mass of the muon, which isn't given here.

EDIT: I found it in a college physics text, the mass is 206.77 times the mass of an

electron,which the same text gives as 9.108 * 10**-28 gram. So the mass of a muon

is 1.883 * 10**-25 grams (to 3 decimal places).

The formula for the deBroglie wavelength (w) is: w = h/p = h/mv, where p is the

particle's momentum, equal to the product of mass (m) and velocity (v). We can find

p = mv = (1.883 * 10**-25 gm)(8.85 * 10**5 cm/sec) = 1.666 * 10**10**-19 g-cm/sec.

h is Planck's constant, equal to 6.625 * 10**-27 erg-sec.

If we divide Planck's constant by p, we get the wavelength in cm.

w = (6.625 * 10**-27)/(1.666 * 10**-19) = 3.976 * 10**-8 cm.

If you want to convert to meters, just divide by 100.

Hope this helps, and that you understand the steps above.

Source(s): college physics