What is effective nuclear charge?
Before we go ahead, let us brush up on some basic physics. As you may know, like charges repel each other, while unlike charges attract. A positive charge will attract negative charges, while repelling other positive charges with the electromagnetic (Coulomb) force. Similarly, negative charges will attract other positive charges, while repelling other negative charges. What binds the electron cloud to the atomic nucleus is the attractive electromagnetic force between electrons and protons inside the nucleus. After this basic review, we can begin exploring the concept of effective nuclear charge, which is helpful in our endeavor to understand atomic structure. What is Effective Nuclear Charge? The simplest and most completely understood atom is the Hydrogen atom. It’s inherent simplicity, implied by the fact that it consists of one electron revolving around a single proton, makes it easy to calculate its atomic orbitals. The Schrodinger equation for the Hydrogen atom is exactly solvable
