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The first gamma ray source to be discovered was the radioactive decay process called gamma decay. In this type of decay, an excited nucleus emits a gamma ray almost immediately upon formation. [note 1] Paul Villard, a French chemist and physicist, discovered gamma radiation in 1900, while studying radiation emitted from radium.
Villard was a modest man and he did not suggest a specific name for the type of radiation he had discovered. In 1903, it was Ernest Rutherford who proposed to call Villard's rays gamma rays because they were far more penetrating than the alpha rays and beta rays which he himself had already differentiated and named (in 1899) on the basis of ...
[10]: 43 Becquerel "began looking for a connection between the phosphorescence he had already been investigating and the newly discovered x-rays" [9] of Röntgen, and thought that phosphorescent materials might emit penetrating X-ray-like radiation when illuminated by bright sunlight; he had various phosphorescent materials including some ...
Rutherford therefore gave this third type of radiation the name of gamma ray. [31] All three of Rutherford's terms are in standard use today – other types of radioactive decay have since been discovered, but Rutherford's three types are among the most common.
Gamma rays, at the high-frequency end of the spectrum, have the highest photon energies and the shortest wavelengths—much smaller than an atomic nucleus. Gamma rays, X-rays, and extreme ultraviolet rays are called ionizing radiation because their high photon energy is able to ionize atoms, causing chemical reactions. Longer-wavelength ...
These were defense satellites originally designed to detect gamma rays from secret nuclear testing, but they luckily discovered puzzling gamma-ray bursts coming from deep space. In the 1970s, satellite observatories found several gamma-ray sources, among which a very strong source called Geminga was later identified as a pulsar in proximity.
He had discovered the existence of alpha rays, beta rays, and gamma rays, and had proved that these were the consequence of the disintegration of atoms. In 1906, he received a visit from the German physicist Hans Geiger , and was so impressed that he asked Geiger to stay and help him with his research.
Gamma-ray bursts were discovered in the late 1960s by the U.S. Vela nuclear test detection satellites. The Velas were built to detect gamma radiation pulses emitted by nuclear weapon tests in space. The United States suspected that the USSR might attempt to conduct secret nuclear tests after signing the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in 1963. While ...