Question

Singly-ionized carbon atoms are accelerated through 1050 V and passed into a mass spectrometer to determine the isotopes present. The magnetic field strength in the spectrometer is 0.250 T. (a) Determine the orbital radii for the 12C and 13C isotopes as they pass through the field.

r1 = cm (12C)

r2 = cm (13C)

(b) Show that the ratio of the radii may be written in the form

r1/r2 = sqrt m1/m2

by verifying that your radii in part (a) satisfy this formula.

r1/r2=

sqrt m1/m2=

Answer 1