1895
- Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen
of Germany experiments with black paper wrapped around
a Geisler Tube & notices a nearby powdered
substance fluorescing. Curious about what manner of
radiation was passing through the black paper, he
first placed a board & then a book of 1,000 pages
between the tube &
the powder, but that only dimmed its glow.
He
later began experimenting with the rays & a fluorescent
screen, accidentally passing his hand between the
two and seeing a
silhouette of his bones on the screen.
Within
about a month he took the first x-ray photo, which
was of his wife's hand.
Rautgen received the 1st Nobel prize for Science,
gave the prize money to the University of Würzburg,
refused to patent his invention, and
taught physics into his 70's.
A
"Diffraction Grating" was need to study
these new "Rautgen(Röntgen)Rays", later called X-Rays, because they
were too small for ordinary methods of measurement,
and it was presumed natural crystals had an extremely
architectural structure that would assist in the separation
of the x-rays so they could be further studied. The
assumptions were proven correct when x-ray photography
revealed the ordered, trellised formation of the molecules
in crystals. This allowed the x-rays to be "diffracted",
since the crystals were small enough to alter the path
of the x-rays and "sort" them by wavelength.
The
"braking" of a cathode-ray electron, or its
sudden deceleration upon striking mass, causes heat
by transferring its kinetic energy to
electromagnetic energy.
A
faster electron will also produce light.
Even
faster electrons can interfere with electron shells
close
to the nucleus, producing an x-ray.
Contrast
the loss of electrons at outer orbit with those at inner
orbit - this produces a greater change to the structure
of the atom
(analogy of a brick wall losing bricks at the top versus at
the bottom).
Electrons from outer level forcefully replace those lost at
inner orbit, releasing a large discharge of energy. (about one in 1,000 fast-moving electrons will reach to
this inner level & actually produce an x-ray).
1912
- as assistant at the University of Manchester,
Henry Moseley studies atomic structure with
the x-rays by producing diffraction patterns of various
elements.
By using an x-ray tube, and also by substituting the
prism with a crystal,
he was able to produce an X-ray Spectrograph.
X-rays were produced from differing elements which
were placed as anticathodes in the path of the electron-emitting,
negatively charged cathode.
X-ray
Spectrometer -
a spectrometer using x-rays to activate the inner electrons
of an atom in order to separate and identify the chemical
constituents of a substance and their concentrations.
- Dictionary.com
Discovery
of the smallest electric charge - definition of the electric
charge as energy, not the electron itself:
Electricity
is not the flow of electrons, instead it's the electrons
and protons themselves. - amasci.com/miscon/whatdef.html