There are many units for measuring dose and exposure. X-ray is a unit of measurement, an international unit of dose for x-rays or gamma rays, named after Professor Wilhelm Conrad Roentgen, the man who invented x-rays in 1895. This type of radiation helps not only to see broken bones, but also to analyze stones on Mars. X-rays are part of a larger electromagnetic spectrum that ranges from radio waves to powerful gamma rays.
Maria and Pierre Curie
In 1903, Nobel laureates in physics, Maria and Pierre Curie, were among those scientists who studied and promoted the use of X-rays. Marie Curie, nee Skłodowska, immigrated to Paris from Poland at the age of 24 to continue her studies in mathematics and physics. There she met and married Pierre Curie, a respected physicist, and soon they began to work together, studying various elements of radiation, including waves of electromagnetic energy.
Now we know that radiation can be very dangerous, but then little was known about it. Maria and Pierre Curie and their daughter Irene, who also worked with them in her laboratory, were exposed to such extremely high levels of radiation every day that they all suffered from health problems. Maria and Irene controlled thousands of x-rays in the French battles during the First World War, and nothing protected them except clothing on their backs. Both mother and daughter eventually died from diseases caused by the harmful effects of radiation. Even now, Curie's working papers (and even their cookbook) contain such dangerous levels of radioactivity.
What is x-ray radiation?
X-rays are powerful waves of electromagnetic energy. Waves, like those in the ocean, are a movement of energy. When you clap your hands, the energy in this case sounds, starts at the source. Sound travels through the air until it reaches your eardrum and is registered as sound. Waves that pass through a physical medium, like air and water, are called mechanical waves.
Electromagnetic (EM) waves do not require the movement of a physical medium, so they can exist both on Earth and in space, where there is no air for the passage of even sound waves. EM waves are organized by spectrum according to the distance between each wave and the wave frequency per second, measured in hertz (Hz). The waves with the lowest frequencies and the largest distances between the waves produce a relatively small amount of energy. Radio waves, for example, have the lowest frequencies of various categories of waves in the electromagnetic spectrum, and gamma rays created by nuclear explosions have the highest frequencies.
X-rays are a band of electromagnetic waves immediately in front of gamma rays in the EM spectrum. They are at the far end and, along with gamma rays and some ultraviolet rays, are shown to be damaging to DNA. As we know from the injuries sustained by Pierre, Maria, and their daughter Irina during their X-ray experiments, the X-rays are very strong on their own. About one quintillion waves per second — 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 Hz — we think of them as “rays” of energy, not waves.
Use of x-rays
When they were first discovered more than 100 years ago in 1895 by William Conrad Roentgen, X-rays were used in much the same way as we use them now - to see the bones inside our bodies. X-rays often showed x-rays, depicting bones in the wife's hand. Bones and other objects are denser than skin. They absorb enough radiation to create shadows on the x-ray film and show us when the bones are broken, or you can see if the child swallowed a coin. X-ray is also a unit for measuring radiation dose.
Something More Than Visible Light
To understand x-rays, you must understand that this form of energy is just a type of light. This can make you think of visible light (the light that can be seen with the human eye). But in science, light is more than just visible light. Light is synonymous with the electromagnetic spectrum, which is a grouping of related types of energy. The electromagnetic spectrum is most often regarded as a diagram that varies from radio waves to gamma rays. In the electromagnetic spectrum, x-rays are ordered next to gamma rays (on the high-energy side of the spectrum). So, when you hear the word “x-ray radiation,” just think about high energy light.
Things you cannot see
Space is made up of billions of stars and galaxies that seem to endlessly go out into space. Although these things can be seen with a powerful telescope, there are some things that are completely invisible, such as gamma rays and x-rays. While you cannot see these powerful waves of energy, they have similar and different properties that make them unique and important in the modern world.
Gamma rays and x-rays are both forms of electromagnetic radiation and waves that contain energy and travel at the speed of light. When considering the electromagnetic spectrum, both waves can be found on the left side of the visible region because they have shorter wavelengths. Shorter wavelengths mean that the frequency and energy of the waves are very large. These properties are very useful because they can travel through objects. Gamma and X-rays are used for visualization, especially for examining internal organs and bones. In addition, such rays are used industrially for the production of products and technologies.
Although gamma rays and x-rays are similar in some aspects, they differ in wavelength and how they develop. Gamma rays have a much higher frequency and shorter wavelength than x-rays. Gamma rays come from radioactive atoms, which decay and radiate energy.
Some emissions are harmful to organisms and cannot be stopped with paper, steel or lead. X-rays come from a rearrangement of electrons inside an atom. X-rays can be harmful depending on the amount and location of exposure, therefore precautions are taken in medical and industrial conditions where X-rays are used.
What is ionizing radiation?
Before defining a unit of measurement - an x-ray, you need to understand what radiation is. This is a very general term used to describe any process that transfers energy through space or material away from a source. Light, sound and radio waves are all examples of radiation. However, when most people think about radiation, they think about ionizing radiation, which can destroy atoms and molecules inside the body. Although scientists think of these outliers in very mathematical terms, they can be visualized either as subatomic particles or as rays.
What is ionization? Atoms consist of relatively large particles (protons and neutrons) sitting in the central nucleus, in the orbit of which are smaller particles (electrons): a miniature solar system. Usually the number of protons in the center of an atom is equal to the number of electrons in orbit. An ion is any atom or molecule that does not have a normal number of electrons. Ionizing radiation is any type of radiation that has enough energy to detonate electrons from atoms or molecules, creating ions.
How is ionizing radiation measured?
Dimension is the basis of modern science, but the number itself does not convey any information. Useful measurements are needed as a tool for measuring (e.g. a stick to measure length) and agreement on the units to be used (e.g. inches, meters or miles). The units selected will differ for the purpose of measurement. For example, a cook will measure the oil in terms of tablespoons to ensure the taste of the food, and the nutritionist can take more care to measure calories to determine the health effects of the food.
The variety of units used to measure radiation and radioactivity sometimes confuses even scientists if they do not use them every day. It may be useful to keep in mind the purpose of the various units. There are two main reasons for measuring radiation: studying physics and studying the biological effects of radiation. What creates complexity is that our instruments measure physical effects, while some of them are of interest for biological effects. Another complication is that units, like words of any language, can disappear from use and be replaced by new units.
Radiation is not a series of different events, such as radioactive decays, which can be individually taken into account. Bulk radiation measurement is like measuring sand movement in an hourglass; it is more useful to think of it as a continuous stream rather than a series of separate events. The intensity of a beam of ionizing radiation is measured by counting the number of ions that it creates in the air. An x-ray per hour is a unit of measure that displays the ability of x-rays to ionize air. This is a unit of impact that can be measured directly.
X-ray - a unit of measurement of ionizing radiation
X-rays are part of the electromagnetic spectrum, the wavelength of which is less than visible. Different applications use different parts of the x-ray spectrum. X-rays make up x-rays, a form of electromagnetic radiation. Most x-rays have a wavelength of from 0.01 to 10 nanometers, which corresponds to frequencies in the range from 30 Hz to 30 exahertz (3 × 10 16 Hz to 3 × 10 19 Hz) and energies in the range of 100 eV to 100 keV. X-rays are shorter than UV rays and usually longer than gamma rays.
X-ray is a unit of measure, which is a traditional unit of exposure, which was the amount of radiation needed to create one electrostatic charge unit of each polarity in one cubic centimeter of dry air. The effect of ionizing radiation on matter (especially living tissue) is more closely related to the amount of energy deposited in them, and not to the generated charge. 1 x-ray is a unit of measurement of 2.58 × 10 -4 C / kg. This measure of absorbed energy is called the absorbed dose.