Question #dbca8
1 Answer
Jul 6, 2017
Orbits are elliptical accelerations, whereas orbitals are the probability density of electrons on certain energy levels being "somewhere" within an atom.
Explanation:
An orbit is a simple elliptical acceleration of one body around another as a function of some force.
In the context of quantum mechanics, an orbital is the probability density of a certain wave function plotted on an xyz plane. For instance, the 1s orbital is a sphere that grows as a function of increasing principal quantum number.
