Chemistry Open Book Paper Atomic spectroscopy is a chemical analysis technique and it is used to identify what elements are in a compound. It uses the idea of a photon being absorbed or emitted whenever an electron changes from one energy level to another. The diagram below shows sodium salt being sprinkled onto a flame and yellow light being emitted. Emission spectra are produced by thin gases in which the atoms do not experience many …showed first 75 words of 918 total…

…showed last 75 words of 918 total…a higher energy level and emitted when falling to a lower level. Each element has discreet energy levels, which can be identified by looking at absorption and emission spectra so the composition of anything which emits radiation can be found. Acknowledgements The sources of additional information used were: Salters Advanced Chemistry “Chemical Ideas”. Internet resource pages / www.sp.uconn.edu www.gly.ac.uk www.csep10.phys.utk.edu Encarta 2000 Word Count: 967 Abstract Word Count: 50