Abstract
IT is known (Phil. Mag., December 1897) that when in a material molecule there exists an independently vibrating group of ions or electrons, for all of which the ratio e/m. of electric charge to inertia is the same, then the influence of a magnetic field H on the motions of this group is precisely the same as that of a rotation with angular velocity ω, equal to ½eH/mc2, imposed on the group around the axis of the field, on the hypothesis that the extraneous forces acting on the ions are symmetrical with respect to this axis. This result involves the main features of the Zeeman effect; it requires that the separations of the doublets representing the spectral lines arising from such a group must all be equal when measured in differences of frequency, or be inversely as the square of the wave-length in vacuum when measured in differences of wave-length, a relation which Preston has recently found to obtain for the natural series of lines in ordinary spectra.
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On the Origin of Magneto-Optic Rotation1. Nature 59, 597 (1899). https://doi.org/10.1038/059597a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/059597a0