Shells and the electronic structure notation

The principle quantum number determines to which shell the electron belongs:
K($n=1\mbox{)},$ L($n=2\mbox{)},$ M($n=3\mbox{)}$, N($n=4\mbox{)}.$

The subshells are named:
$s$($l=0$), $p$($l=1$), $d$($l=2$), $f$($l=3$)

For the K shell, only the $s$ subshell is possible - so there are two possible electrons corresponding to $m_{s}=-\frac{1}{2}$ and $m_{s}=+\frac{1}{2}$.

For the L shell, we can have an $s$ subshell with 2 electrons and 6 from the $p$ subshells ( $l=1,\, m_{l}=\{-1,0,1\},\, m_{s}=\pm\frac{1}{2}$). So in all, 8 electrons may reside in this shell.

Likewise, the M shell can hold 18, and the N shell, 32.



Subsections

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