# Physics307L:People/Carrillo/Balmer Series

## Balmer Series Lab Summary

• Please note that Ginny was my lab partner for this lab.

### Purpose

The purpose of this lab was to learn how to measure the spectra lines of hydrogen and deuterium and compare them to the current accepted values. We observed them through a spectroscope. In theory, excited electrons emit photons of wavelengths that are equivalent to the energy of the excited electrons. The electrons were excited by using electrical simulation. With our data we were able to measure the Rydberg constant R. The following equation is as follows.

${\displaystyle {\frac {1}{\lambda }}=R({\frac {1}{m^{2}}}-{\frac {1}{n^{2}}})}$
${\displaystyle m=1,2,3,...\,\!}$
${\displaystyle n=2,3,4,5,...\,\!}$
${\displaystyle n>m\,\!}$

### Calculations and Analysis

• As you can see from my lab notebook, the calculated Rydberg constants for Hydrogen and Deuterium are listed below.
${\displaystyle R_{Hydrogen,average}\approx 1.0989562\pm 0.008\times 10^{7}m^{-1}\,\!}$
${\displaystyle R_{Deuterium,average}\approx 1.1077221\pm 0.007\times 10^{7}m^{-1}\,\!}$

### Error

${\displaystyle \%error={\frac {R_{accepted}-R_{measured}}{R_{accepted}}}}$
${\displaystyle \%error_{Hydrogen}\approx 0.20\%\,\!}$
${\displaystyle \%error_{Deuterium}\approx .998\%\,\!}$