building an atom-simulator out of magnets

[lemur]

I don't know if this would be a very accurate way to model the motion of electrons but I'll explain it and see what people think about it:

 

First, think of taking 6 or so round magnets with a hole in the center and connecting them so that all the same poles are facing outward. Basically this would give you balls that would repel each other in all directions. Next. attach two or more of these balls to a "nucleus" that gets them revolving around a center-point, maybe using connecting rods.

 

Now, if the two repellant balls were orbiting and could freely change direction to follow any path through the surface of the sphere they are confined to, how would their repellant force affect their orbital paths/patterns?

 

They would inertially resist each change of direction from a straight orbital path, I would think, but each time they were pushed into a new path by the other ball, they would continue in a straight orbital path until the next meeting with the other ball, right?

 

If you could build more than one such "atom-simulator" and you pushed the two toward each other until the "electron spheres" intersected each other, would they organize into complimentary orbits in a way that would "bond" the two "atoms" as in a chemical bond?

Edited December 1, 2010 by lemur

[Cap'n Refsmmat]

First, think of taking 6 or so round magnets with a hole in the center and connecting them so that all the same poles are facing outward. Basically this would give you balls that would repel each other in all directions.

I don't think this will work. One way or another, your ball of magnets will have a north pole and a south pole, no matter how hard you try to arrange them.

[lemur]

I don't think this will work. One way or another, your ball of magnets will have a north pole and a south pole, no matter how hard you try to arrange them.

Picture a "star" made of several bolts welded together so that they form a radial pattern in all directions. Then thread the flat round magnets onto the bolts through their holes so that they are in fixed position. Would the fields reconfigure to align even if the magnets were bolted to prevent them from flipping around?

[Sisyphus]

Well, two problems. First, even if that worked, you wouldn't be simulating an atom, you would be simulating what sounds like the Rutherford model. Electrons aren't balls literally orbiting the nucleus. They have not orbits but orbitals, which are better envisioned as "clouds of probability" (scare quotes intentional) described by a wave function.

 

Second, as Cap'n said, you can't create an object with the same polarity in all directions, which would basically amount to a giant magnetic monopole. The "north" parts and the "south" parts on the surface of the object have to be equal. What would likely happen in the scenario described is not a single north and south pole, but a north pole in the middle of each component magnet and a south around the edges, and the whole thing would be neutral from any significant distance.

 

It might help to picture magnetic field lines, and remember that they all form loops, extending through the magnet, out one side, curving around, and back in the other, like this:

 

[lemur]

Well, two problems. First, even if that worked, you wouldn't be simulating an atom, you would be simulating what sounds like the Rutherford model. Electrons aren't balls literally orbiting the nucleus. They have not orbits but orbitals, which are better envisioned as "clouds of probability" (scare quotes intentional) described by a wave function.

 

Well, I wonder if the probabilistic aspect of the orbitals couldn't be caused by the fact that the electrons would randomly repel each other into slightly altered orbital trajectories. Anyway, are you sure the magnets couldn't be arranged and fixed in such a way that they would exhibit south-polarity uniformly outward so as to repel each other. The distance wouldn't matter; it's just that they need to repel each other when they get sufficiently close in their orbits.