Why is that in an external magnetic field(uniform) the degeneracy of d,f orbitals is lost but the degeneracy of p orbitals remain intact if the main cause of losing degeneracy is the difference in energy of differently oriented orbitals in the magnetic field?
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asked May 5, 2013 at 7:32
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$\begingroup$ Do you have a source stating the degeneracy of p orbitals in the presence of an external magnetic field? $\endgroup$– LordStrykerCommented Jun 5, 2013 at 19:52
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2 Answers
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My textbook states that the energy of the p orbitals will split in a magnetic field. (Physical Chemistry, McQuarrie, p.210)
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$\begingroup$ On a sidenote, do you recommend that book? I've been looking at it. $\endgroup$– user1160Commented Feb 20, 2014 at 8:59
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1$\begingroup$ I do like this textbook - it's fairly straightforward and not too bad to understand. However, I haven't used other pchem textbooks in depth, so I'm not sure if this is the best out there. Heard the Levine text was good as well. $\endgroup$– halcyonCommented Feb 22, 2014 at 4:04
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$\begingroup$ I used to teach from McQuarrie, it was heavy! but definitely the best out there. $\endgroup$ Commented Jun 6, 2014 at 0:48
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Any energy that belong to orbitals with non-zero angular moment (ie. anything, except s orbitals) will split in magnetic field.
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$\begingroup$ Can you provide more details? $\endgroup$ Commented Jun 7, 2014 at 9:24
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$\begingroup$ Check the Zeeman-effect (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeeman_effect) in your preferred textbook. It describes how magnetic field interacts with atoms (molecules etc). The electronic part of it generally can be factored to an angular and a spin contribution. Sometimes they are strongly couples (e.g. lanthanides) and it doesn't work, but at basic level we don't care about those cases. From that it comes that angular contribution exist always when there is a non-zero angular moment. $\endgroup$– GregCommented Jun 8, 2014 at 16:57