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Compton Effect and Experimental Description and

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38 views

Compton Effect and Experimental Description and

physics

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kabilankabi213
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© © All Rights Reserved
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Introduction of Modern Physics

Lecture-2
PHY1701, Engineering Physics

Fall Semester 24-25

Compton Effect
Compton provided the most conclusive confirmation o f t he p article a spect o f r adiation. B y s cattering X-rays
off f ree e lectrons, h e f ound t hat t he wavelength o f t he s cattered r adiation i s l arger t han t he wavelength o f the
incident radiation. This can be explained only by assuming that the X-ray photons behave like particles.

At issue here is to study how X-rays scatter off free e lectrons. According to classical physics (wave therory),
the incident and scattered radiation should have the same wavelength. This can be viewed as follows. Classically,
scattering would be a process of absorption and re-radiation. Part of the energy of the light wave would be
absorbed by the electron, which would oscillate in response to the oscillating electric field o f t he w ave. The
oscillating electron would act like a miniature antenna, re-radiating its acquired energy as scattered waves in a
variety of directions. The frequency at which the electron oscillates would be the same as the frequency of the
incident light, and the re-radiated light would have the same frequency as the oscillations of the electron. So,
in the wave model, the scattered light and incident light have the same frequency and same wavelength. The
predictions of classical physics is not compatible with experiment. The experimental findings of Compton reveal
that the wavelength of the scattered X-radiation increases by an amount ∆λ (λ′ − λ), called the wavelength
shift or Compton shift, and that ∆λ depends not on the intensity of the incident radiation, but only on the
scattering angle.

Figure 1: (a) and (b) Compton scattering of a photon (of energy hν, wavelength λ and momentum p⃗) off a free,
stationary electron. After collision, the photon is scattered at angle θ with wavelength λ′ . (c) Schematic of a
Compton-effect experiment.

Compton succeeded in explaining his experimental results only after treating the incident radiation as a
stream of particles—photons—colliding elastically with individual electrons. In the photon model we imagine
the scattering process as a collision of two particles, the incident photon and an electron that is initially at
rest (Figure 1(a)). The incident photon would give up part of its energy and momentum to the electron, which
recoils as a result of this impact. The scattered photon that remains can fly off at a variety of angles θ with
respect to the incident direction, but it has less energy and less momentum than the incident photon (Figure
1(b)). The energy and momentum of a photon are given by E = hν = hc/λ and p = hν/c = h/λ. Therefore, in

1
the photon model, the scattered light has a lower frequency (ν ′ ) and longer wavelength (λ′ ) than the incident
light.
h
∆λ = λ′ − λ = (1 − cosθ) (1)
mc
where, λ and λ′ are the wavelengths of the incident and scattered radiation. h, m, c, and θ are the Planck’s
constant, rest mass of the electron, speed of light in vacuum, and scattering angle, respectively. ∆λ is also known
as Compton shift. The term h/mc is known as Compton wavelength λC . The value of Compton wavelength for
electron λC = 2.43 × 10−12 m.

Figure 2: Experimental confirmation of Compton scattering. The greater the scattering angle, the greater the
wavelength change, in accord with Eq. (1)

The Compton wavelength gives the scale of the wavelength change of the incident photon. From Eq. (1)
we note that the greatest wavelength change possible corresponds to θ = 180o , when the wavelength change
will be twice the Compton wavelength λC . Because λC = 2.426 pm for an electron, and even less for other
particles owing to their larger rest masses, the maximum wavelength change in the Compton effect for electron
is 4.852 pm. Changes of this magnitude or less are readily observable only in x-rays: the shift in wavelength
for visible light is less than 0.01 percent of the initial wavelength, whereas for x-rays of λ = 0.1 nm it is sev-
eral percent. The Compton effect is the chief means by which x-rays lose energy when they pass through matter.

The experimental demonstration of the Compton effect is straightforward. As in Fig. 1 (c), a beam of x-rays
of a single, known wavelength is directed at a target, and the wavelengths of the scattered x-rays are determined
at various angles θ. The results, shown in Fig. 2, exhibit the wavelength shift predicted by Eq. 1, but at each
angle the scattered x-rays also include many that have the initial wavelength.

Extreme cases
1. Minimum Compton shift or no shift at θ = 0o , in this case ∆λ = 0, i.e. λ = λ′ .
2. Maximum Compton shift at θ = 180o , in this case ∆λ = 2h/mc, i.e. X-rays are back scattered or the
maximum energy will be transferred to the electron. The kinetic energy gained by the electron will be
K.E.e = hν − hν ′ = hc/λ − hc/λ′ .

Reference Material
1. Quantum Mechanics Concepts and Applications, Second Edition, Nouredine Zettili, John Wiley & Sons,
Ltd.

2. University Physics with Modern Physics, 15th Global Edition by Young, Hugh D., Freedman, Roger A,
Pearson Education Limited.
3. Concepts of Modern Physics, Authur Beiser, McGraw Hill Education.

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