Fermi Gas Properties

Adrian Down
November 04, 2005
1 Total energy
1.1 Review
Recall the results for the last lecture,
D() =
V
2
2
_
2m

2
_3
2

1
2

F
=

2
2m
_
3
2
N
V
_3
2
where D() is the density of states at energy and
F
is the Fermi energy.
At absolute zero, the energy levels are completely lled up to the Fermi
energy. As is increased, some electrons pass from just below
F
to just
above
F
. The magnitude of determines this smearing eect.
1.2 Derivation
The total energy is given by the integral over all possible energies times the
number of states with a given energy, D(), times the probability of obtaining
a state with the given energy, f().
U(T) =
_

0
f()D()
1
We restrict our attention to the total energy at absolute zero, U(0). In this
limit, f() becomes a step function,
f() =
_
1 <
F
0 >
F
With this substitution,
U(0) =
_

F
0
D()d
=
_

F
0
V
2
2
_
2m

2
_3
2

3
2
d
=
V
5
2
_
2m

2
_3
2

3
2
F
=
3
5
_
V
3
2
_
2m

2
_3
2

3
2
f
_

F
From the denition of the Fermi energy,
N =
V
3
2
_
2m

2
_3
2

3
2
F
With this substitution,
U(0) =
3
5
N
F
Alternatively,
U(0) =
3
5
Nk
b
T
F
1.3 Comparison with the classical gas
Compare this with the energy of a classical gas at STP,
U(T) =
3
2
Nk
b
T
The energy of the fermi gas is higher by a factor of about
T
F
T
, which is on
the order of 10
2
. Because of the Pauli exclusion principle, the energies of the
occupied orbitals in the Fermi gas are much higher than those in the classical
gas, where quantum mechanical eects are neglected.
2
2 Pressure
2.1 Derivation
By the same arguments that cause the energy of the Fermi gas to be much
higher than that of the classical gas, we expect the pressure of the Fermi gas
to be much higher than that of a classical gas.
First, write the energy as a function of N and V so that we can employ
a thermodynamic relationship.
U(0) =
3
5
N
F
=
3
5
_

2
2m
_
3
2
_2
3
_
N
5
3
V

2
3
Recall the expression for pressure,
p =
_
U
V
_
,N
Doing the dierentiation,
p =
2
5

2
2m
_
3
2
_2
3
_
N
V
_5
3
Substitute for
F
to remove the constants,
p =
2
5
N
V

F
Rewrite
F
in terms of T
F
,
pV =
2
5
Nk
b
T
F
2.2 Comparison to the classical gas
This expression is reminiscent of that for the pressure in a classical gas, pV =
Nk
b
T, but the temperature has been replaced by the Fermi temperature.
For 1 mol of sodium,
V 23 cm
3
= 23 10
6
m
3
T
F
35, 000 K
p =
2
5
R
V
T
F
5 10
9
Pa
3
For a classical gas at STP,
p 10
5
Pa
The pressure of the Fermi gas is much higher than that of the classical
gas for several reasons,
1. T
F
is very large, usually about 2 orders of magnitude higher than T
2. The density of an electron gas is much greater than that of a classical
gas
As in the case of the total energy calculated above, the Pauli exclusion
principle forces up the energy of the occupied states in the Fermi gas much
higher than in the case of the classical gas.
3 Heat capacity
Note. We do an order of magnitude calculation. The exact derivation is
found in Kittel & Kromer.
Start at = 0. As is increased, electrons near
F
become excited above

F
. For any reasonable temperature, the electrons in the lower states are not
aected by the change in temperature. They cannot be excited because all
of the states above them are already occupied. Only electrons within about
k
b
T of the boundary can be eected.
The number of electrons that are eected is proportional to the density
of states times the energy range,
#electrons excited D(
F
)k
b
T
N

F
k
b
T N
T
T
F
The increase in the energy is proportional to the energy of these electrons
times the number of electrons excited,
U = N
T
T
F
k
b
T
The heat capacity is then computed as the derivative,
C
v
=
_
U
T
_
V
2Nk
b
T
T
F
4
Note. This is less than the classical result by the factor
T
T
F
. The heat capacity
of an electron gas is roughly one percent of that of a classical gas at STP.
The exact calculation gives the proper numerical factors,
C
v
=

2
2
Nk
b
T
T
F
= T
where is a constant that is characteristic of the material.
The total heat capacity for a metal below the DeBye temperature is often
written in terms of the two separate components,
C
v
= T
..
electrons
+ AT
3
..
phonons
4 Paramagnetism
Suppose a magnetic eld is applied to a Fermi gas. At T = 0, the gas is
unaected because the orientation of the spins of the electrons in the gas is
completely determined by the Pauli exclusion principle. As the temperature
is raised, only the spins of electrons very close to
F
that do not share an
orbital can be ipped.
Previously, we derived Curies law, the classical result for the paramag-
netism of xed spins,

C
=
N
2
B
k
b
T
For the Fermi-Dirac electron gas,

FD

N
2
B
k
b
T
T
T
F
=
N
2
B
k
b
T
F

T
T
F

c
This paramagnetic eect in a Fermi gas is called Pauli paramagnetism.
5
5 Summary
The Fermi gas is utterly constrained by the Pauli exclusion principle, in
contrast to the classical gas in which quantum mechanical eects are not im-
portant. Usually, the results for the Fermi gas dier from the classical results
by a scaling on the order of
T
T
F
. Remember that T
F
is not a temperature but
only a convenient way of representing the Fermi energy.
6 White dwarfs
A white dwarf star is one that has undergone a gravitational collapse and
hence is extremely dense, possibly on the order of 10
6 g
cm
3
. At densities this
high, matter is thought to consist of two independent gasses of electrons and
nucleons.
If we assume the density is 10
6
, then
N
V
will be bigger than that of sodium
by 6 orders of magnitude. The Fermi energy will be increased by something
like

F

F,Na
_
N
V
_2
3
Converting this to a temperature,
T
F
3 10
4
eV 3 10
8
K
The temperature of the white dwarf is measured to be about 10
7
. The
actual temperature is much less than T
F
, so the electrons form a Fermi gas.
However, the same is not true of the protons.
F
scales inversely as the
mass, and the mass of the proton is 2000 times that of the electron, thus

F,p

3 10
8
2000
10
5
K
which is much less than the energy of the star. Quantum mechanical eects
will be negligible for the protons, so they can be treated as an ideal gas. The
dierent behavior of the electrons and protons is a result of their dierence
in mass.
6