In reply to Stephen Cooke's message of Fri, 11 Mar 2016 23:33:51 +0100: Hi, [snip] >Once the metal atoms are excited into these high energy states, particularly >if the inner electrons are removed from their inner orbitals I suppose further >bremsstrahlung interactions of high energy electrons with those atoms would no >longer produce characteristic X-Ray's? At least until the nuclei were no >longer energised and able to de-excite back to their ground level i.e. during >cool down? > Deactivation is usually quite rapid (tiny fraction of a second). Only "prohibited" transitions are slow. That means that most atoms will "deactivate" long before the next excitation event occurs to the same atom. Nuclear weapon detonation may be an exception. :)
Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://rvanspaa.freehostia.com/project.html
