A mass spectrometer is being used to separate common oxygen-16from the much rarer oxygen-18, taken from a sample of old glacialice. (The relative abundance of these oxygen isotopes is related toclimatic temperature at the time the ice was deposited.) The ratioof the masses of these two ions is 16 to 18, the mass of oxygen-16is 2.66 × 10-26 kg, and they are both singly charged and travel at4.9 × 106 m/s in a 1.45 T magnetic field.
What is the separation between their paths in meters when theyhit a target after traversing a semicircle?
Δd =
