Emission Spectra

• Emission Spectra


  If you give an element or compound lots of energy, it will emit light of a specific colour to that substance
• Emission Spectra


  1. Energy could be provided by heating it

  2. Energy could be provided by passing an electric current through the substance
• Emission Spectra


  • The colour can be further split up into coloured lines of specific frequencies by a prism or diffraction grating
• Brian Cox: 'Stardust'
• Energy level


  One of the fixed, allowed levels of energy for an electron
• Ground state


  The lowest possible energy state an electron could inhabit
• In the diagram below, each electron shell can be thought of as an individual energy level