Monday, July 7, 2008

MaxWell's Speed Distribution Law

MaxWell's Speed Distribution Law

It is an equation giving the distribution of molecules in different speeds in a gas at a temperature.

If dN represents the number of molecules with speeds between v and v+dv then

dN = 4πN[m/2πkT]3/2v²e-mv²/2kTdv

where
dN represents the number of molecules with speeds between v and v+dv
N = total number of molecules in the gas
m = mass of a molecule
T = absolute temperature of the gas
v = velocity of the molecules

The speed vp at which dN/dv is maximum is called the most probable speed.
Its value is given by

vp = √(2kT/m)

(Topic: Kinetic theory of gases)

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