Particle in a Box

[Brandon McClelland3L]

Can someone explain the particle in a box model to me? I don't really understand why the amplitude of the wave has to be 0 at the ends of the box and I also don't completely understand what the wavefunction represents.

[Jamie Wang 3C]

It is showing the difference between classical and quantum objects. A classical object has the same likelihood to be at any spot in the box while quantum objects are more likely to be found at certain places.

[Andrew Wang 1C]

I think the amplitude of the wave is 0 at the ends of the box because that's where the box's borders are, so there is no chance that the particle will actually be at that location (since it's already taken by the edges of the box). The wavefunction represents the probability that the particle will be in a specific location, so the higher the amplitude, the more likely the particle will be there.

[Trevor_Ramsey_3H]

Do we need to know this for the Midterm? I don't remember him going over this in lecture.

[Tikva Cohen 1K]

I only remember seeing this is one homework problem and it was one of the ones my TA went over in class and he never did the particle in a box thing or talked about it so I’m hoping we don’t really need to know it for the midterm.

[FrancescaHawkins2H]

I believe the professor mentioned the particle in a box model just very briefly, but said that we do not need to know/understand it for the midterm or this class.