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- The velocities of the particles
- in a sample can be represented
- graphically. On Cartesian axes, the
- x-coordinate is the speed of a particle.
- The y-coordinate is the number of
- particles at the speed designated by
- the x-coordinate. When the number
- of particles at each particular speed
- is graphed, the result is a curve known
- as a Maxwell-Boltzmann
- distribution. The curve has a peak
- around the center and a long tail to the
- right of the graph (i.e. toward
- increasing speed). At higher
- temperatures, the average molecular
- speed of the sample is higher. Thus the
- peak of the Boltzmann distribution will
- be farther to the right of the graph and
-
-