{"version":"1.0","provider_name":"Rainbow Dash Network","provider_url":"http:\/\/rainbowdash.net\/","type":"link","title":"aaaaaaaaaa (aaaaaaaaa)'s status on Wednesday, 25-May-11 19:06:07 UTC","author_name":"aaaaaaaaaa (aaaaaaaaa)","author_url":"http:\/\/rainbowdash.net\/aaaaaaaaa","url":"http:\/\/rainbowdash.net\/notice\/124587","html":"@<span class=\"vcard\"><a href=\"http:\/\/rainbowdash.net\/user\/218\" class=\"url\" title=\"Brendan\"><span class=\"fn nickname\">abigpony<\/span><\/a><\/span> So basically, these electrons that you blast out with x-ray radiation will actually become wavelike (recall the whole particle\/wave duality thing), and will bounce off neighbouring atoms and cause interference patterns that we can measure. It turns out that these specific patterns and whatnot are element-specific. So, for example, if you shoot an x-ray of, say, 11.8 keV of energy into something, and you get a signal response, you know that it's a particular element (for this example, 11.8 is Arsenic)"}