Abstract
A RECENT paper published by Lord Rayleigh1under this title contains observations and measurements indicating a duration of the Balmer lines of more than 105 sec., that is, approximately a thousand times the duration found by experiments with positive rays2 and also calculated from quantum mechanics. While earlier experiments3 do not allow quantitative conclusions to be drawn, Lord Rayleigh's recent experiments must be regarded as being conclusive. The method mainly consists in producing in an electrodeless glass tube a strong luminosity of the Balmer spectrum induced by a powerful condenser discharge. Part of the gas is blown out of the electric field by thermal expansion into a side tube, where the luminosity extends a considerable distance outside the region of excitation and where the decay of the Balmer lines is observed and measured. Lord Rayleigh attempts no explanation of this apparent discrepancy ; but especially asks for one. It may be appropriate and worth while, therefore, to point out that it seems to us that his experiments and similar ones can be understood on the basis of the known relatively long life of free hydrogen atoms and their re-excitation by radiation and especially by diffusing electrons and positiveions ; also the recombination of positive ions (protons) may play some part4.
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References
Proc. Roy. Soc., A, 183, 26 (1944); see also Nature, 155, 84 (1945), and Jablonski, A., Nature, 155, 397 (1945).
Wien, W., Ann. Phys., 73, 483 (1924); for a critical discussion of these and other experiments, see Mitchell, A. C. G., and Zemansky, M. W., "Resonance Radiation and Excited Atoms" (Cambridge, 1934), chap. 3, §3 and §7.
Strutt, R. J., Proc. Roy. Soc., A, 94, 88 (1917).
See Jablonski, A., Nature, 155, 397 (1945).
Bonhoeffer, K. F., Phys. Chem., 113, 199 (1924); 116, 393 (1925); see also Erg. d. exacten Naturwiss., 6, 207 (1927), etc.
Born, M., and Franck, J., Z. Phys., 31, 411 (1925).
The subject of âimprisonedâradiation in atomic gases and its reabsorption diffusion and âpersistenceâ is collected and discussed in Mitchell and Zemansky's "Resonance Radiation and Excited Atoms", chapters 3 and 4; the exact quantum mechanical theory of this subject has been worked out by E. A. Milne, J. Lond. Math. Soc., 1, 1 (1926).
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BORN, M., FÜRTH, R. & LADENBURG, R. Long Duration of the Balmer Spectrum in Hydrogen. Nature 157, 159 (1946). https://doi.org/10.1038/157159a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/157159a0
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