Charles Barkla

“Charles Glover Barkla, British physicist, won the 1917 Nobel Prize in physics for his work on x-ray scattering, which occurs when x-rays pass through a material and are deflected by the atomic electrons. This technique proved useful in the study of atomic structure.”

” Barkla’s first researches concerned the velocity of electric waves along wires but in 1902 he commenced his investigations on Röntgen radiation which were to occupy almost his whole life. His discovery of homogeneous radiations characteristic of the elements showed that these elements had their characteristic line spectra in X-ray and he was the first to show that secondary emission is of two kinds, one consisting of X-rays scattered unchanged, and the other a fluorescent radiation peculiar to the particular substance. He discovered the polarisation of X-rays, an experimental result of considerable importance for it meant that X-radiation could be regarded as similar to ordinary light. Barkla made valuable contributions to present knowledge on the absorption and photographic action of X-rays and his later work demonstrated the relation between the characteristic X-radiation and the corpuscular radiation accompanying it. He has also shown both the applicability and the limitation of the quantum theory in relation to Röntgen radiation.  “

REFERENCES:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Glover_Barkla

https://www.mayoclinicproceedings.org/article/S0025-6196(12)60068-8/fulltext