>>7997103
Stefan-boltzmanns law?

>>7997103
Transitioning electrons emit photons.

>>7997107
What do you mean by transitioning?

If you heat up a metal, it goes red hot and emits photons. (Correct?)
What happens if it cools back down to solid and you heat it again? Have the photons returned to the metal? Thanks

Microscopically there's lots of motion going on between the atoms inside a hot object. This gives rise to particles bouncing off eachother. Due to microscopic forces the particles gain acceleration. If a particle with charge is accelerated it creates a distortion in the EM field, which is a photon.

>>7997114
>>7997114

Yes. That precisely happens in the process of cooling off

>>7997124
So you're saying that photons are not particles, but a distortion which sometimes acts like a wave and sometimes a particle?

>>7997114
Objects contain charged particles, when they accelerate they emit radiation. This causes glowing. Search terms:
>Stefan-Boltzmann law
>Wien's displacement law
>Planck's law
>Thermal radiation

>>7997138
I guess you could go either ways.
A photon is a particle that sometimes acts like a wave.
An distortion in the EM field is a wave that sometimes acts like a particle.

>>7997129
How do the photons return to the metal though? Or does it not work like that, are they more of a wave that you can't exactly 'run out of'? Thanks for your help.

>>7997143
Okay, I think I'm getting it, so you're saying that you can't run out of photons, they're simply the energy released?

>>7997148
Pretty much, yeah.

>>7997144

Photons are an energy wave. They simply are the form of energy emitted when electrons are made more energetic

>>7997139
Will do, thanks!

>>7997148
I'm don't know. QM is fucked up. The wave explanation makes more sense to me.

>>7997151
>>7997152
Okay, so if the energy is released when it's hot, and when it cools back down it has the energy again, why does it regain it's energy? Where does it get it's energy back from?

Also, if it's just photons, what's stopping it from emitting all different types of electromagnetic waves as well?

Thanks

Important fundamental:
Heat is nothing more than the movement of particles.

>>7997159

It cools down from releasing the energy. It doesn't gain energy, it loses energy. The energy comes from you heating it up

>>7997155
Wait this is quantum mechanics? :0

>>7997162
And is light the same but with photons yes?

>>7997159
>>7997159

Also photons ARE all types of electromagnetic waves.
The difference between Infrared and Gamma Rays is simply their wavelength and thus energy

>>7997159
All EM is photons; visible light is just the part of the spectrum that's visible.

>>7997163
Oh! Thank-you I just realised that my thinking was backwards, I was thinking that there's energy in the metal that is released when it's heated, that's cleared a lot of things up thanks!

>>7997168
>>7997169
Ah yes sorry, I meant to say, is other EM radiation released when heated or is it just visible light?
Could heating a metal release microwaves? :/

>>7997165
The experiment that showed that electromagnetic waves can act as a packet of quantized energy (photons) was fundamental result for the development of QM.

>>7997184
Yeah I feel a little out of my depth in that case XD

>>7997139
The first three are all just laws to describe the fourth. Good job.
Search for black body radiation. That is what it's called.