Determination of the Planck's constant using black body

radiation

Experiment No. 1

Physics Lab 3: Thermal Physics & Statistical Mechanics

Department of Physics,
School of Physical Sciences,
Central University of Karnataka, Kalaburagi

1 Aim of the experiment

To determine the Planck’s constant using black body radiation

2 Apparatus

1. A commercially available tungsten lament incandescent light bulb rated at 60 W, 220-

240 V.

2. Variac (0-220 V),

3. Connecting wires,

4. Digital multimeters to measure current I and voltage V ,

5. Bandpass filter of red wavelength,

6. Silicon photo-detector

7. Aperture to modulate power density incident on detector,

8. Digital oscilloscope
 9. Enclosing black box and cylindrical tube

10. Optical rail.

3 Theory
The working theory behind the experiment involves the treatment quantization of light
together with the understanding of statistical physics. According to Planck’s law, an object
will radiate a spectrum of light dependent on the temperature of the object. The Planck
theory proposed that the energy carried away from the object in the form of photons with
an energy given by:

Where is Planck’s reduced constant and is the angular frequency of the photon
emitted. If emitted photons are treated as a photon gas, one can use a statistical approach to
derive the ‘Planck radiation law’3, which is given as follows:

( )
( )
( )

where is the intensity of the emitted light, is the temperature of the black body emitter,
is the frequency of the photon and is Boltzmann’s constant. Furthermore the
dependence upon the temperature of the black body implies that the number of photons a
black body emits at a specific frequency is determined by the temperature of the black
body. It is this relationship that is exploited in order to experimentally determine Planck’s
constant.
Consider the ratio of two separate intensities measured at the same frequency, and .
From Eqn. 2, this ratio is given as:

( ) ( )

( ) ( )

The approximation of the formula is valid in the regime in which

 where is given in units of Hertz and in units of Kelvin. For the visible spectrum of
light as well as the near infrared spectrum, these conditions are well satisfied.
Consequently, Eqn. 3 can be expressed to give Planck’s reduced constant:

( )
( )

From Eqn. 4, can be experimentally determined by the ratio of intensities of a black body
at two separate temperatures. However in the case of the experiment, it is more useful to
collect a multitude of data relating the intensity to multiple values of temperature for a
specific wavelength of light. In this situation, it is more precise to use the method of least-
squares to extract the value of Planck’s constant. In linear form, Eqn. 4 becomes:

[ ]

where is the dependent variable and acts as the independent variable. Using this

form, a least-squares analysis will yield in relationship to the selected frequency at a

given temperature.
The measurement of the temperature of the filament without making direct contact with
bulb is somewhat tricky task. We will use the following technique to get reasonably
accurate results.
For an ideal blackbody, the emitted power can be found out using Stefan-Boltzmann law,

Suppose we supply electrical energy to the incandescent bulb. The electric power that goes
into the bulb is

where is the current and is the resistance. Assume that the total electrical power going
into the filament is entirely emitted by radiative processes, i.e.
 For temperatures ranging from room to about 2500 K, a tungsten filament supposedly obeys a
linear relation between its resistance and temperature,

( )

where represents ambient resistance measured at ambient temperature and

is temperature coefficient of resistivity. However, may itself depend on temperature.
Instead, we assume a non-linear relation between and given by the power law

where is an unknown constant. Under this assumption, Equation (7) becomes,

Later in the experiment we will use this equation to determine the value of for our light bulb.
This value of will later be used to estimate the temperature of the filament using the following
equation,

( )

Here is the resistance of the unenergized bulb at temperature .

4 Experimental Procedure
1. The experimental setup is shown in Fig. 1. Connect a 60 W incandescent light bulb to the
variac through an ammeter (digital multimetrer) in series.
2. A digital voltmeter is also connected in parallel to measure voltage values.
3. The variac is an AC transformer that gives variable voltages.
4. You are provided with a cylindrical tube with bulb fitted inside it.

5. Inert this cylindrical tube into the black box.

6. Fix the bulb position. Now assemble the optical components and connect the silicon
photodiode to digital oscilloscope.

Ammeter

Black box

Light bulb
Digital oscilloscope
Variac (0-220 V)

Fig. 1: Schematic diagram of the experimental set up for Planck’s Constant.

Table. 1: Experimental results

7. Measure the room temperature resistance of light bulb. Note down the laboratory
temperature . Note down the uncertainties in the measured quantities.
8. Now we would like to measure for different settings of the variac. We will also
note the corresponding intensity recorded from the oscilloscope. Take measurements
between 30 to 220 V. Note down , , and calculate and . Table (1) provides
 you with a sample template.
9. Plot a graph of versus and determine the value of the slope and the intercept
using weighted fit of a straight line.
10. Calculate the value of using equation (12). You will require this parameter to calculate
bulb's temperature. Use the value of obtained in equation (13) to determine the filament
temperature . Calculate the corresponding uncertainties for the complete range of
voltage.
11. Calculate the value of using Equation below

( )( ( )) ( )

5 Result
The calculated value of Planck’s constant