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phetsims / atomic-interactions

"Atomic Interactions" is an educational simulation in HTML5, by PhET Interactive Simulations.
GNU General Public License v3.0
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User suggestion: "diatomic molecule diameter" #81

Closed oliver-phet closed 5 years ago

oliver-phet commented 5 years ago

In the "atomic interactions" html5 simulation, when one selects "custom attraction" it is written sigma "atom diameter". It would be more precise to write sigma "diatomic molecule diameter" because its a molecule. I can make the same comment for the french translation (I imagine all of them are derived from the original english version)

arouinfar commented 5 years ago

Aside from oxygen-oxygen, none of these atoms are actually bonded, so it would be inaccurate to describe them as molecules. The σ parameter is a term in the Lennard-Jones potential (the red curve in the sim). The value of σ in the model is the Van der Waals radius for the non-bonding atomic pairs, and for oxygen-oxygen (the only pair of atoms that actually bonds) the value is the average bond length. The Van der Waals radius is widely used as a measure of atomic radius. For the Custom Attraction option, increasing σ will increase the atomic diameter.

@oliver-phet can you reply to the user?

oliver-phet commented 5 years ago

Replied!

arouinfar commented 5 years ago

Thanks!