PLANCK’S DISTRIBUTION LAW

Group 8

Kwame Nkrumah University Of Science And Technology

Group8@gmail.com

October 16, 2018

Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 1 / 10
Black Body Radiation
Experience show that the temperature of a hot and a cold object placed
close to each other equalize in vacuum.
Fact
All macroscopic objects in all temperature emit (and absorb) thermal
radiation spontaneously. This radiation consists of electromagnetic waves.
The energy of the electromagnetic waves emitted by a surface, in unit time
and in unit area, depends on the nature of the surface and on it’s
temperature.

Black Body
Black-body radiation has a characteristic, continuous frequency spectrum
that depends only on the body’s temperature. The spectrum is peaked at
a characteristic frequency that shifts to higher frequencies (shorter
wavelengths) with increasing temperature, and at room temperature most
of the emission is in the infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 2 / 10
 Planck Concept
Planck’s theory describes the spectral densities of electromagnetic
radiation emitted by a black body in thermal equilibrium at a given
temperature T. The Law was named after Max Planck who proposed it in
1900. It is the pioneering result of modern physics and quantum theory.

Spectral Radiance
The spectral radiance of a body refers to the amount energy it gives off as
radiation of different frequencies. It is measured as the power emitted per
unit area of the body per unit solid angle through which the radiation is
measured.

Motivation
In this lecture we will derive plancks distribution formular and touch on
some ramifications of this ground breaking thoeritical formulation.

Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 3 / 10
 Consider a cubical box of side L and imagine waves bouncing back and
forth inside it. The box has fixed, rigid, perfectly conducting walls.
Therefore, the electric field of the electromagnetic wave must be zero at
the walls of the box and so we can only fit waves into the box which are
multiples of half a wavelength. That is to say only wave vectors
corresponding to
nπ
k=
L
for all dimensions of the wave vector. A wave oscillating in three dimen-
sions with any of the allowed values of l, m, n satisfies the boundary
conditions and so every point in the lattice represents a possible mode of
oscillation of the waves within the box in the figure, consistent with the
boundary conditions.

Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 4 / 10
 Figure: points representing wave modes

P represents the radius and dp a small elemental length. In three

dimensions the wave modes could be written as
A(x, y , z) = Ao sin(kx x) sin(ky y ) sin(kz z)
We need the number of modes of oscillation in the frequency interval ν to
ν + dν. Hence we count all the lattice points in k-space k to k + dk. The
volume can be written as 4πv 2 dv .
Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 5 / 10
 Considering l,m and n space, we take just one-eigth of the entire volume
of the sphere. The volume is given by 4πp 2 dp.The number density of
lattice points is one per unit volume of (l, m, n) space and the number of
modes is given by
 
1
dN(p) = N(p)dp = 4πp 2 dp
8

Since k = πp/L and dk = πdp/L, we find

L3 2
dN(p) = k dk
2π 2
But L3 = V is is the volume of the box and k = ω/c = 2πν/c. Therefore,
we can rewrite the expression

L3 2 V 8π 3 ν 2 4πν 2 V
dN(p) = 2
k dk = 2 3
dv = dν
2π 2π c c3
Because of the nature of light waves, there are two independent states
associated with each lattice point (l, m, n).
The final result is that the number of modes of oscillation in the frequency
interval ν + dν is

8πν 2 V
dN = dν
c3
Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 6 / 10
 Thus, per unit volume, the number of states is

8πν 2
dN = dν
c3

Quantization
The quantisation of electromagnetic radiation means that the energy of a
particular mode of frequency ν cannot have any arbitrary value but only
those energies which are multiples of hν, in other words the en- ergy of the
mode is E (ν) = nhν, where we associate n photons with this mode.

We now consider all the modes (and photons) to be in thermal equilibrium

at temperature T . In order to establish equilibrium, there must be ways of
ex- changing energy between the modes (and photons) and this can occur
through interactions with any particles or oscillators within the volume or
with the walls of the enclosure.

Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 7 / 10
 We now use the Boltzmann distribution to deter- mine the expected
occupancy of the modes in ther- mal equilibrium. The probability that a
single mode has energy En = nhν is given by the usual Boltzmann factor

exp(−En /kT )
p(n) = P∞
n=0 exp(−En /kT )
Where the denominator is the normalization or partition function which
ensures that the total probability is unity.
The mean energy of the mode of frequency ν is therefore
P∞
n=0 En exp(−En /kT )
Eν = P ∞
n=0 exp(−En /kT )
P∞
n=0 nhν exp(−nhν/kT )
Eν = P ∞
n=0 exp(−nhν/kT )
To simplify the calculation, let us substitute x = exp(−hν/kT )

Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 8 / 10
 P∞
nx n x + 2x 2 + 3x 3 + ...
E ν = hν Pn=0
∞ n
= hν
n=0 x 1 + x + x 2 + ...
Now, we remember the following series expansions:
1
= 1 + x + x 2 + x 3 + ...
(1 − x)

1
= 1 + 2x + 2x 2 + 3x 3 + ...
(1 − x)2
Hence, the mean energy of the mode is:
hν
Eν =
exp(−hν/kT ) − 1

we have already shown that the number of modes in the frequency interval
ν to ν + dν is (8πν/c 3 dν). Hence energy density per mode of radiation is
given will be;
8πν 2
u(ν)dν = 3 E ν dν
c
Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 9 / 10
 8πhν 3 1
u(ν)dν = 3
dν
c exp(−hν/kT ) − 1
Whew!!, The above equation is the Planks Distribution law which
describes the spectral density of radiation

Results
The spectral radiance of a body at different frequencies is quantised.

Group 8 (Physics Department, KNUST) Black Body Radiation October 16, 2018 10 / 10