My question is 'what does the area under the curve represent?' it's a Maxwell-Boltzmann curve.
My first idea was the number of particles but that's just what the y axis says and surely that wouldn't just mean under the curve.
My second idea was to write that anything before the activation energy line would not have sufficient energy and anything after would.
Any help would be much appreciated.
There is a number of different horizontal axis versions of the Maxwell-Boltzmann probability funcitons. Most often, it is Energy or speed of molecules.
The area underneath must be total energy below some certain energy, or speed. So at the activation energy point, the area would represent the quantity of energy in the material that is below the threshold for activation. The area left to the right, is the amount of energy in the material that meets the threshold or is above it.
Consider water evaporating. The curve for it, consider the horizontal axis to be speed of molecules (or energy, or temperature). Draw a vertical line on the tail, we will call that the speed for the water molecules sufficently great to escape the surface of water, and become gas. So the area above, is the amount of water energy lost in evaporation, thus, the average temperature has to go down in the water remaining (which we observe).
Cumulative area: total energy below some point.
The area under the curve of a Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution represents the fraction of particles with a given energy. It provides information about the distribution of energies for a system of particles.
To understand this concept, let's break it down step by step:
1. Interpretation of the y-axis: In a Maxwell-Boltzmann curve, the y-axis usually represents the number of particles or the probability. So your initial idea of the y-axis representing the number of particles is correct.
2. Understanding the area under the curve: The area under the curve contains meaningful information about the distribution of energies. Instead of counting the number of particles, think of the area as a fraction or percentage of the total number of particles. This means that the higher the area under a specific region of the curve, the greater the fraction of particles with energies within that range.
3. Activation energy: The activation energy line you mentioned is unrelated to the interpretation of the area under the curve. The activation energy refers to the minimum amount of energy required for a chemical reaction to occur. It is not directly connected to the distribution of particle energies represented by the Maxwell-Boltzmann curve.
To summarize, the area under the curve of a Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution represents the fraction of particles with a given energy. It gives insights into the distribution of energies within a system. The y-axis represents either the number of particles or the probability, and the area under the curve indicates the proportion of particles within different energy ranges. The concept of activation energy is a separate topic in chemical reactions and does not directly relate to the area under the curve.