CHEM 1A Lecture Notes - Lecture 30: Black-Body Radiation, Emission Spectrum, Electric Field
Document Summary
Many examples can be given to show that light is a form of energy. Not surprisingly, the opposite is also true: many exothermic reacions, and more generally, objects at high temperature generate light. The wave model portrays light as oscillaing electric and magneic ields propagaing through space with the speed of light. This model suggests that any object with oscillaing electrons is a source of electromagneic radiaion simply because moving charges induce an oscillaing electric ield. This is indeed how blackbody radiaion is generated. The frequencies of electron oscillaions in a body follow a broad distribuion just as the gas molecules at a paricular temperature exhibit a broad distribuion of kineic energies. This leads to emission of radiaion of all these frequencies. Increasing the temperature of a blackbody shits the emission spectrum to higher frequencies or shorter wavelengths. Also, the intensity of the emited radiaion increases exponenially with temperature.
