Search results
Results from the WOW.Com Content Network
This is a list of sources of light, the visible part of the electromagnetic spectrum.Light sources produce photons from another energy source, such as heat, chemical reactions, or conversion of mass or a different frequency of electromagnetic energy, and include light bulbs and stars like the Sun. Reflectors (such as the moon, cat's eyes, and mirrors) do not actually produce the light that ...
Another example is incandescent light bulbs, which emit only around 10% of their energy as visible light and the remainder as infrared. A common thermal light source in history is the glowing solid particles in flames, but these also emit most of their radiation in the infrared and only a fraction in the visible spectrum.
Visible light such as sunlight carries radiant energy, which is used in solar power generation. In physics, and in particular as measured by radiometry, radiant energy is the energy of electromagnetic [1] and gravitational radiation. As energy, its SI unit is the joule (J).
By definition, visible light is the part of the EM spectrum the human eye is the most sensitive to. Visible light (and near-infrared light) is typically absorbed and emitted by electrons in molecules and atoms that move from one energy level to another. This action allows the chemical mechanisms that underlie human vision and plant photosynthesis.
Since the energy levels of electrons in atoms are discrete, each element and each molecule emits and absorbs its own characteristic frequencies. Immediate photon emission is called fluorescence, a type of photoluminescence. An example is visible light emitted from fluorescent paints, in response to ultraviolet . Many other fluorescent emissions ...
An example of this phenomenon is when clean air scatters blue light more than red light, and so the midday sky appears blue (apart from the area around the Sun which appears white because the light is not scattered as much). The optical window is also referred to as the "visible window" because it overlaps the human visible response spectrum.
By recording the attenuation of light for various wavelengths, an absorption spectrum can be obtained. In physics, absorption of electromagnetic radiation is how matter (typically electrons bound in atoms) takes up a photon's energy—and so transforms electromagnetic energy into internal energy of the absorber (for example, thermal energy). [1]
(E is Energy; h is the Planck constant; c is the speed of light; λ is wavelength.) When an X-ray photon collides with an atom, the atom may absorb the energy of the photon and boost an electron to a higher orbital level, or if the photon is extremely energetic, it may knock an electron from the atom altogether, causing the atom to ionize.