QUANTUM PHYSICS FOR BEGINNERS: The Principal Quantum Physics Theories made Easy to Discover the Hidden Secrets of the Universe with the Most Famous Quantum Experiments by Richard J. Schrödinger

QUANTUM PHYSICS FOR BEGINNERS: The Principal Quantum Physics Theories made Easy to Discover the Hidden Secrets of the Universe with the Most Famous Quantum Experiments by Richard J. Schrödinger

Author:Richard J. Schrödinger [Schrödinger, Richard J.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-11-10T00:00:00+00:00


Fluorescent Lights:

Incandescent light bulbs from the old school make light by having a wire heat to create a shining white glow that makes them quantum in the same way as a toaster. You get light from another groundbreaking quantum process if you have fluorescent bulbs-either the long tubes or the newer twisty CFL bulbs.

Way back in the early 1800s, physicists discovered that each element in the periodic table has a specific spectrum: if you get a vapor of atoms hot, they emit light in a small number of distinct frequencies, each having a different pattern. These "spectral lines" were used rapidly to classify the composition of unknown materials and even to discover formerly unknown elements-helium; for instance, it was identified as a spectral line that was previously unknown in sunlight.

No one could explain the fact until 1913 when Niels Bohr took up Planck's quantum idea (which Einstein expanded in 1905) and provided the first quantum model of an atom. Bohr suggested that some special states allow an electron to orbit the nucleus of an atom gladly and that atoms are only absorbed and released by traveling between them. The frequency of the absorption or emission of light depends on the energy difference between states in the way that Planck implements, giving a set of distinct frequencies for each individual atom.

This was a radical idea but was working brilliantly to understand the spectrum of light produced by hydrogen and even the x-rays provided by a large range of elements. Although the modern image of what is happening in an atom varies considerably from the Bohr model, the core concept is the same: electrons travel inside the atoms between the special states by absorbing and emitting light from certain wavelengths.

This is the central concept behind fluorescent lighting: There is a little mercury vapor inside a fluorescent bulb (whether a long tube or CFL), which is excited into a plasma. Mercury released light at wavelengths that typically dropped through the visible spectrum so that our eyes would assume the light appeared white. You can see some distinct colored pictures of the bulb as the incandescent bulb offers a continuous rainbow smear as you look at a fluorescent light through a cheap diagonal grating, as you can see in new glasses.

Therefore, when you use fluorescent lights to illuminate your home or office, you are grateful for quantum physics.



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