Re: Lab sparks make x-rays

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: Jim Lux <jimlux@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>

At 07:44 AM 11/2/2005, you wrote:
> Original poster: Bert Pool <bert.tx@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>
> Current article in Science Daily talks about how not only natural 
> lightning produces x-rays, but how recent studies have shown that 
> laboratory sparks of 1.5 to 2 million volts in the air does too.
>
> You can bet Tesla coils probably are doing it too.
>
> http://www.sciencedaily.com/upi/index.php?feed=Science&article=UPI-1-20051101-20182700-bc-us-lightning.xml
>
> Bert Pool

The actual paper is in Geophysical Research Letters,

Dwyer, J. R., H. K. Rassoul, Z. Saleh, M. A. Uman, J. Jerauld, and J. 
A. Plumer (2005), X-ray bursts produced by laboratory sparks in air, 
Geophys. Res. Lett., 32, L20809, doi:10.1029/2005GL024027.


Anyway.. it's a nice observation, but I'm interested as to why they 
didn't mention the well known production of soft X-rays by discharges 
with very high di/dt.  I don't recall the numbers, but 10 years ago 
or so, I was looking into whether this could occur with conventional 
spark production gear (exploding wires, in my case).


I doubt that TCs have enough voltage or current.