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Re: X-ray peaks



The intensities of K-beta x-rays during an x-ray fluorescence experiement generally run about 20% of the K-alpha x-rays. If your
source shows these reversed, your source has a misprint. As I write this I am looking at a table of intensities for K x-rays for
all elements, and there are none for which the K-beta intensity is higher.

There are some funny historical artifacts about naming various x-rays lines. For example, the K-alpha-one line is higher energy
than the K-alpha-two line, whereas the K-beta-one line is lower energy than the K-beta-two line. In fact the K-beta-one and
K-beta-two lines are each mixtures of lines. These were named before instrumentation existed that could resolve all the details of
the spectrums.

However, if we ignore the fine details, that is, if we have a spectrum in which the K-alpha and K-beta are resolved from each other,
but we do not resolve any further than this, then the K-alpha is always more intense than the K-beta by about a factor of five.

Michael D. Edmiston, Ph.D.
Professor of Physics and Chemistry
Chair of Sciences
Bluffton College
Bluffton, OH 45817
(419)-358-3270
edmiston@bluffton.edu

This posting is the position of the writer, not that of SUNY-BSC, NAU or the AAPT.