Stern–Gerlach experiment

In quantum physics, the Stern–Gerlach experiment demonstrated that the spatial orientation of angular momentum is quantized. Thus an atomic-scale system was shown to have intrinsically quantum properties. In the original experiment, silver atoms were sent through a spatially-varying magnetic field, which deflected them before they struck a detector screen, such as a glass slide. Particles with non-zero magnetic moment were deflected, owing to the magnetic field gradient, from a straight path. The screen revealed discrete points of accumulation, rather than a continuous distribution, owing to their quantized spin. Historically, this experiment was decisive in convincing physicists of the reality of angular-momentum quantization in all atomic-scale systems. After its conception by Otto Stern in 1921, the experiment was first successfully conducted with Walther Gerlach in early 1922. Spin quantum number The Stern–Gerlach experiment involves sending silver atoms through an inhomogeneous magnetic field and observing their deflection. The results show that particles possess an intrinsic angular momentum that is closely analogous to the angular momentum of a classically spinning object, but that takes only certain quantized values. Another important result is that only one component of a particle's spin can be measured at one time, meaning that the measurement of the spin along the z-axis destroys information about a particle's spin along the x and y axis. The experiment is normally conducted using electrically neutral particles such as silver atoms. This avoids the large deflection in the path of a charged particle moving through a magnetic field and allows spin-dependent effects to dominate. If the particle is treated as a classical spinning magnetic dipole, it will precess in a magnetic field because of the torque that the magnetic field exerts on the dipole (see torque-induced precession). If it moves through a homogeneous magnetic field, the forces exerted on opposite ends of the dipole cancel each other out and the trajectory of the particle is unaffected.