Consider an object containing 9 one-dimensional oscillators (this object could represent a model of 3 atoms in an Einstein solid). There are 5 quanta of vibrational energy in the object.
(a) How many microstates are there, all with the same energy?
1287 microstates
(b) If you examined a...
I understand that a microstate is one possible distribution of energies that make up the system's total energy. But I can't understand why, in a monatomic gas for example (where there is only translational kinetic energy of atoms), there is a finite number of states. Surely that would mean that...