Mossbauer Experiment

Recoilless Emission

  • Start with a nucleus: Fe57 : emits a photon (14.4 keV)
    • There is a nuclear recoil to conserve momentum.. Takes away some energy
      • Photon energy slightly less than the energy gap
    • Consequence: This means that iron foil is transparent to its own radiation.

Mossbauer trick: recoil is against the lattice. (quantum effect)

Can now use this to test the local environment

  • Electron density
  • Nuclear Magnetic fields

Energy Levels

Source vs observer

Goal

  • How big is the magnetic field ?

Experimental Setup

  • piston => Doppler shift only need mm/s
  • Geiger counter

Links: MPL

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