- The Resonance Condition
The Resonance Condition
Consider an isolated nucleus in a steady magnetic field . The magnetic field breaks the symmetry of free space and defines a particular spatial direction. Suppose that the nucleus possesses an intrinsic "spin" with spin number Failed to parse (MathML with SVG or PNG fallback (recommended for modern browsers and accessibility tools): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle I>0} so that it has a magnetic moment. The nucleus will have different energy states depending on the magnitude and direction of the nucleon's magnetic moment.
We know from quantum mechanics that (on small enough scales) energy appears in discrete bits ( Failed to parse (MathML with SVG or PNG fallback (recommended for modern browsers and accessibility tools): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle \hbar} shows its face ).
We can define Failed to parse (MathML with SVG or PNG fallback (recommended for modern browsers and accessibility tools): Invalid response ("Math extension cannot connect to Restbase.") from server "https://wikimedia.org/api/rest_v1/":): {\displaystyle \mu} as the maximum measurable component of the magnetic moment.