48+ Helium Atom Beschriftet Gif. A helium atom is a very simple kind of atom. Helium is composed of two electrons bound by the electromagnetic force to a nucleus containing two protons along with either one or two neutrons, depending on the isotope, held together by the strong force.
This will greatly simplify our algebra in the future and we will typically use atomic units from this point forward.
The helium atom and variational principle: Even though hydrogen typically exists as a diatomic gas, consisting of two atoms bonded together, a single atom. Let the nucleus lie at the origin of our coordinate system, and let the position. The hamiltonian for helium has the same terms as hydrogen but has a large perturbation due to the repulsion between the two electrons.
