Atomic constants deduced from secondary cathode ray measurements

Abstract

1. It is well known that the accurate measurement of the energies of the secondary cathode rays excited by homogeneous X-rays can yield results capable of supplementing our knowledge of the most probable values of the fundamental atomic constants. this application of the "magnetic spectrograph" has already been discussed by one of us in some detail, and kretschmar has published an account of accurate measurements on X-ray electrons, from which he has deduced very consistent values of e / m 0 . In this work Kretschmar used molybdenum K radiations, and produced his magnetic fields by a large solenoid. 2. We have during the past fifteen months photographed a large number of secondary cathode-ray spectra, using cooper K as primary X radiation. For a few elements, for which the results will be detailed later in this paper, we have made very careful measurements of the energies, cross-checking the observations by working in a wide range magnetic fields.