MATSC 302, Solid State Physics Spring 2017

Assignment 2
Due Date: Tuesday March 7 at 4 pm in TA office room 318

Question 1
A conduction electron in a metal is estimated to make N collisions during a period of
timed T . Thus, the Drude relaxation time = T /N. Consider a time interval t  T.
The probability that any one of the N collisions occurs within t is p = t/T. Thus, the
probability Pn that the electron makes precisely n collisions within the interval t is
given by the binomial distribution,
 
N
Pn = pn (1 p)N n
n
a) Consider the case when t is much smaller than . Show that, ignoring terms of
order (t/ )2 or higher, the probability that the electron makes one (or more) collisions
during t is equal to t/.
b) In the limit that N and p 0 such that N p = is finite, the binomial
distribution becomes identical to the Poisson distribution,

Pn = e n /n!
Use the Poisson distribution to find the probability that, during a time interval equal to
t = 2 , the electron makes
(i) no collisions.
(ii) a single collision.
(iii) more than two collisions.

Question 2
Consider a metal in which there are ni impurity atoms per unit volume1 , each atom
having radius ri . Assume that a conduction electron is scattered by an impurity atom
only if it physically touches that atom and that the average speed of the electrons in the
metal is v. Moreover, assume that the scattering time for the pure metal is 0 .
a) Find an estimate of the conduction electrons scattering time i due to collisions with
the impurity atoms.
b) Find an expression for the change in the mobility 2 of the electrons in the metal due
to the presence of impurities.

1
You may assume that ni is low enough that, from the point of view of a conduction electron moving in
the metal, the probability that an impurity atom is overshadowed by another impurity atom is negligible.
2
The mobility is defined by the relationship v = E.

1
Question 3
A metallic specimen is subjected to a homogeneous, time-varying electric field

E(t) = E0 cos t
Solve Drudes equation of motion for the steady state current J(t), t  and show that
it can be written as

J(t) = () E0 cos(t )
and find an expression for the frequency dependent conductivity () and the phase
difference in terms of the parameters m, n, e, and .

Question 4
Consider a monovalent metal with a density of atoms n0 = 0.10
A3 . Calculate the
3
following :
a) The Fermi wavenumber kF in A 1 and the Fermi momentum PF in eV/c.
b) The Fermi energy EF in eV and the Fermi temperature in K.
c) The ratio vF /c, where vF is the Fermi velocity. Find the ratio vF /vT where vT is the
average electron speed at room temperature, assuming the conduction electrons form a
classical ideal gas at room temperature.

Question 5
Consider a metal with a Fermi energy EF = 3eV. The energy of the spin-up (), and
spin-down () electrons is given by

~2 k 2 ~2 k 2
, Ek =
Ek = +
2m 2m
where = 0.50 eV. Find the density n (in
A3 ) and the Fermi energy EF (in eV) for both
the spin-up and the spin-down electrons in the metal.

Question 6
Suppose the energy of electrons in a metal is given by the anisotropic form

~2
 
2 2 1 2
Ek = kx + ky + kz
2m 4
Describe the shape of the Fermi surface in this metal and find the Fermi energy as a
function of the conduction electron density n.

3
Below, c is the speed of light.