What's the difference between gamma rays and x rays?

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En_lizard
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what's the difference between gamma rays and x rays?
 

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En_lizard said:
what's the difference between gamma rays and x rays?

Gamma rays are created by energy transmissions which occur in atomic nuclei. X-rays occur in high energy electron transmissions...

They can have the same frequency, it's the source that makes the distinction. If you randomly found a gamma ray photon in space you wouldn't know whether it was an x-ray photon or a gamma ray photon...
 


DeShark said:
Gamma rays are created by energy transmissions [...]

I think you mean transitions not transmissions.
 


Perhaps the range of frequencies of the two do overlap, but most gamma rays are more energetic than most x-rays.
 


Fundementally they are the same (just different energies) it's an arbitrary line depending on which field you work in. Like the cuttoff between visible and infrared.
 


jtbell said:
I think you mean transitions not transmissions.

Ooops. Yes, of course.
 

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