relationship between ml and l

[Funmi Baruwa]

When L=1, mL= -1,0,or +1. So then how do we determine whether mL is equal to -1, 0, or +1?

[John Pham 3L]

As you said, the relationship is determined for ml as 2l + 1 and each value represents an orbital for the subshell.
You can determine the subshell if given the electron configuration.

Example:
Using the electron configuration of C: 1s2 2s2 2p2
- Since there are 2 electrons in the 2p subshell, we can determine how the orbitals fill up
- There would be 1 e- in ml = -1 and one 1 e- in ml = 0
- For each of these electrons, they then would have different ml values to determine their position.

I don't think that you can determine the mL values for specific e- if only given the three quantum numbers unless it is specified the number of e-
I think we'll just need to know the values of ml that a certain subshell l could take

[Shrey Pawar 2A]

Just as John said, we cannot assume which (-1, 0, 1) mL value the electron is actually present in unless we have the specific number of electrons in a configuration. From my understanding, we just need to know that in a p orbital there can only be two electrons per mL value as they have to have opposite spins of +- 1/2. Hope this helps!