Black-body radiation is the
thermal
A thermal column (or thermal) is a rising mass of buoyant air, a convective current in the atmosphere, that transfers heat energy vertically. Thermals are created by the uneven heating of Earth's surface from solar radiation, and are an example ...
electromagnetic radiation
In physics, electromagnetic radiation (EMR) consists of waves of the electromagnetic (EM) field, which propagate through space and carry momentum and electromagnetic radiant energy. It includes radio waves, microwaves, infrared, (visible) li ...
within, or surrounding, a body in
thermodynamic equilibrium
Thermodynamic equilibrium is an axiomatic concept of thermodynamics. It is an internal state of a single thermodynamic system, or a relation between several thermodynamic systems connected by more or less permeable or impermeable walls. In the ...
with its environment, emitted by a
black body
A black body or blackbody is an idealized physical body that absorbs all incident electromagnetic radiation, regardless of frequency or angle of incidence. The name "black body" is given because it absorbs all colors of light. A black body ...
(an idealized opaque, non-reflective body). It has a specific, continuous spectrum of wavelengths, inversely related to intensity, that depend only on the body's temperature, which is assumed, for the sake of calculations and theory, to be uniform and constant.
[, Chapter 13.]![Black body](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/Black_body.svg)
A perfectly insulated enclosure which is in thermal equilibrium internally contains black-body radiation, and will emit it through a hole made in its wall, provided the hole is small enough to have a negligible effect upon the equilibrium.
The thermal radiation spontaneously emitted by many ordinary objects can be approximated as black-body radiation.
Of particular importance, although planets and stars (including the
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...
and
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...
) are neither in thermal equilibrium with their surroundings nor perfect black bodies, black-body radiation is still a good first approximation for the energy they emit. The sun's radiation, after being filtered by the earth's atmosphere, thus characterises "daylight", which humans (also most other animals) have evolved to use for vision.
A black body at room temperature () radiates mostly in the
infrared
Infrared (IR), sometimes called infrared light, is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than those of visible light. It is therefore invisible to the human eye. IR is generally understood to encompass wavelengths from around ...
spectrum, which cannot be perceived by the human eye, but can be sensed by some reptiles. As the object increases in temperature to about , the emission spectrum gets stronger and extends into the human visual range, and the object appears dull red. As its temperature increases further, it emits more and more orange, yellow, green, and blue light (and ultimately beyond violet,
ultraviolet
Ultraviolet (UV) is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelength from 10 nm (with a corresponding frequency around 30 PHz) to 400 nm (750 THz), shorter than that of visible light, but longer than X-rays. UV radiation ...
).
Tungsten filament
An incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe is an electric light with a wire filament heated until it glows. The filament is enclosed in a glass bulb with a vacuum or inert gas to protect the filament from oxidat ...
lights have a continuous black body spectrum with a cooler colour temperature, around , which also emits considerable energy in the infrared range. Modern-day
fluorescent
Fluorescence is the emission of light by a substance that has absorbed light or other electromagnetic radiation. It is a form of luminescence. In most cases, the emitted light has a longer wavelength, and therefore a lower photon energy, ...
and
LED lights, which are more efficient, do not have a continuous black body emission spectrum, rather emitting directly, or using combinations of phosphors that emit multiple narrow spectrums.
Black holes are near-perfect black bodies in the sense that they absorb all the radiation that falls on them. It has been proposed that they emit black-body radiation (called
Hawking radiation
Hawking radiation is theoretical black body radiation that is theorized to be released outside a black hole's event horizon because of relativistic quantum effects. It is named after the physicist Stephen Hawking, who developed a theoretical a ...
) with a temperature that depends on the mass of the black hole.
[
]
The term ''black body'' was introduced by
Gustav Kirchhoff
Gustav Robert Kirchhoff (; 12 March 1824 – 17 October 1887) was a German physicist who contributed to the fundamental understanding of electrical circuits, spectroscopy, and the emission of black-body radiation by heated objects.
He ...
in 1860. Black-body radiation is also called
thermal radiation
Thermal radiation is electromagnetic radiation generated by the thermal motion of particles in matter. Thermal radiation is generated when heat from the movement of charges in the material (electrons and protons in common forms of matter) i ...
, ''cavity radiation'', ''complete radiation'' or ''temperature radiation''.
Theory
Spectrum
![Gluehfarben no language horizontal](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bd/Gluehfarben_no_language_horizontal.svg)
Black-body radiation has a characteristic, continuous
frequency spectrum
The power spectrum S_(f) of a time series x(t) describes the distribution of power into frequency components composing that signal. According to Fourier analysis, any physical signal can be decomposed into a number of discrete frequencies, ...
that depends only on the body's temperature,
[
] called the Planck spectrum or
Planck's law. The spectrum is peaked at a characteristic frequency that shifts to higher frequencies with increasing temperature, and at
room temperature most of the emission is in the
infrared
Infrared (IR), sometimes called infrared light, is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than those of visible light. It is therefore invisible to the human eye. IR is generally understood to encompass wavelengths from around ...
region of the
electromagnetic spectrum
The electromagnetic spectrum is the range of frequencies (the spectrum) of electromagnetic radiation and their respective wavelengths and photon energies.
The electromagnetic spectrum covers electromagnetic waves with frequencies ranging fro ...
.
As the temperature increases past about 500 degrees
Celsius, black bodies start to emit significant amounts of visible light. Viewed in the dark by the human eye, the first faint glow appears as a "ghostly" grey (the visible light is actually red, but low intensity light activates only the eye's grey-level sensors). With rising temperature, the glow becomes visible even when there is some background surrounding light: first as a dull red, then yellow, and eventually a "dazzling bluish-white" as the temperature rises. When the body appears white, it is emitting a substantial fraction of its energy as
ultraviolet radiation
Ultraviolet (UV) is a form of electromagnetic radiation with wavelength from 10 nm (with a corresponding frequency around 30 PHz) to 400 nm (750 THz), shorter than that of visible light, but longer than X-rays. UV radiation i ...
. The
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...
, with an
effective temperature of approximately 5800 K, is an approximate black body with an emission spectrum peaked in the central, yellow-green part of the
visible spectrum
The visible spectrum is the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum that is visible to the human eye. Electromagnetic radiation in this range of wavelengths is called ''visible light'' or simply light. A typical human eye will respond to wa ...
, but with significant power in the ultraviolet as well.
Black-body radiation provides insight into the
thermodynamic equilibrium
Thermodynamic equilibrium is an axiomatic concept of thermodynamics. It is an internal state of a single thermodynamic system, or a relation between several thermodynamic systems connected by more or less permeable or impermeable walls. In the ...
state of cavity radiation.
Black body
All normal (
baryon
In particle physics, a baryon is a type of composite subatomic particle which contains an odd number of valence quarks (at least 3). Baryons belong to the hadron family of particles; hadrons are composed of quarks. Baryons are also classif ...
ic) matter emits electromagnetic radiation when it has a temperature above
absolute zero. The radiation represents a conversion of a body's internal energy into electromagnetic energy, and is therefore called
thermal radiation
Thermal radiation is electromagnetic radiation generated by the thermal motion of particles in matter. Thermal radiation is generated when heat from the movement of charges in the material (electrons and protons in common forms of matter) i ...
. It is a
spontaneous process In thermodynamics, a spontaneous process is a process which occurs without any external input to the system. A more technical definition is the time-evolution of a system in which it releases free energy and it moves to a lower, more thermodynamic ...
of radiative distribution of
entropy
Entropy is a scientific concept, as well as a measurable physical property, that is most commonly associated with a state of disorder, randomness, or uncertainty. The term and the concept are used in diverse fields, from classical thermodynam ...
.
Conversely, all normal matter absorbs electromagnetic radiation to some degree. An object that absorbs all radiation falling on it, at all
wavelength
In physics, the wavelength is the spatial period of a periodic wave—the distance over which the wave's shape repeats.
It is the distance between consecutive corresponding points of the same phase on the wave, such as two adjacent crests, t ...
s, is called a black body. When a black body is at a uniform temperature, its emission has a characteristic frequency distribution that depends on the temperature. Its emission is called black-body radiation.
The concept of the black body is an idealization, as perfect black bodies do not exist in nature.
However,
graphite
Graphite () is a crystalline form of the element carbon. It consists of stacked layers of graphene. Graphite occurs naturally and is the most stable form of carbon under standard conditions. Synthetic and natural graphite are consumed on lar ...
and
lamp black
Carbon black (subtypes are acetylene black, channel black, furnace black, lamp black and thermal black) is a material produced by the incomplete combustion of coal and coal tar, vegetable matter, or petroleum products, including fuel oil, fluid ...
, with emissivities greater than 0.95, are good approximations to a black material. Experimentally, black-body radiation may be established best as the ultimately stable steady state equilibrium radiation in a cavity in a rigid body, at a uniform temperature, that is entirely opaque and is only partly reflective.
A closed box with walls of graphite at a constant temperature with a small hole on one side produces a good approximation to ideal black-body radiation emanating from the opening.
Black-body radiation has the unique absolutely stable distribution of radiative intensity that can persist in thermodynamic equilibrium in a cavity.
In equilibrium, for each frequency, the intensity of radiation which is emitted and reflected from a body relative to other frequencies (that is, the net amount of radiation leaving its surface, called the ''spectral radiance'') is determined solely by the equilibrium temperature and does not depend upon the shape, material or structure of the body.
For a black body (a perfect absorber) there is no reflected radiation, and so the spectral radiance is entirely due to emission. In addition, a black body is a diffuse emitter (its emission is independent of direction). Consequently, black-body radiation may be viewed as the radiation from a black body at thermal equilibrium.
Black-body radiation becomes a visible glow of light if the temperature of the object is high enough. The
Draper point The Draper point is the approximate temperature above which almost all solid materials visibly glow as a result of blackbody radiation. It was established at 977 °F (525 °C, 798 K) by John William Draper in 1847.
Bodies at tempera ...
is the temperature at which all solids glow a dim red, about . At , a small opening in the wall of a large uniformly heated opaque-walled cavity (such as an oven), viewed from outside, looks red; at , it looks white. No matter how the oven is constructed, or of what material, as long as it is built so that almost all light entering is absorbed by its walls, it will contain a good approximation to black-body radiation. The spectrum, and therefore color, of the light that comes out will be a function of the cavity temperature alone. A graph of the amount of energy inside the oven per unit volume and per unit frequency interval plotted versus frequency is called the ''black-body curve''. Different curves are obtained by varying the temperature.
Two bodies that are at the same temperature stay in mutual thermal equilibrium, so a body at temperature ''T'' surrounded by a cloud of light at temperature ''T'' on average will emit as much light into the cloud as it absorbs, following Prevost's exchange principle, which refers to
radiative equilibrium Radiative equilibrium is the condition where the total thermal radiation leaving an object is equal to the total thermal radiation entering it. It is one of the several requirements for thermodynamic equilibrium, but it can occur in the absence of t ...
. The principle of
detailed balance The principle of detailed balance can be used in kinetic systems which are decomposed into elementary processes (collisions, or steps, or elementary reactions). It states that at equilibrium, each elementary process is in equilibrium with its reve ...
says that in thermodynamic equilibrium every elementary process works equally in its forward and backward sense. Prevost also showed that the emission from a body is logically determined solely by its own internal state. The causal effect of thermodynamic absorption on thermodynamic (spontaneous) emission is not direct, but is only indirect as it affects the internal state of the body. This means that at thermodynamic equilibrium the amount of every wavelength in every direction of thermal radiation emitted by a body at temperature ''T'', black or not, is equal to the corresponding amount that the body absorbs because it is surrounded by light at temperature ''T''.
When the body is black, the absorption is obvious: the amount of light absorbed is all the light that hits the surface. For a black body much bigger than the wavelength, the light energy absorbed at any wavelength ''λ'' per unit time is strictly proportional to the black-body curve. This means that the black-body curve is the amount of light energy emitted by a black body, which justifies the name. This is the condition for the applicability of
Kirchhoff's law of thermal radiation
In heat transfer, Kirchhoff's law of thermal radiation refers to wavelength-specific radiative emission and absorption by a material body in thermodynamic equilibrium, including radiative exchange equilibrium. It is a special case of Onsage ...
: the black-body curve is characteristic of thermal light, which depends only on the
temperature
Temperature is a physical quantity that expresses quantitatively the perceptions of hotness and coldness. Temperature is measurement, measured with a thermometer.
Thermometers are calibrated in various Conversion of units of temperature, temp ...
of the walls of the cavity, provided that the walls of the cavity are completely opaque and are not very reflective, and that the cavity is in
thermodynamic equilibrium
Thermodynamic equilibrium is an axiomatic concept of thermodynamics. It is an internal state of a single thermodynamic system, or a relation between several thermodynamic systems connected by more or less permeable or impermeable walls. In the ...
.
When the black body is small, so that its size is comparable to the wavelength of light, the absorption is modified, because a small object is not an efficient absorber of light of long wavelength, but the principle of strict equality of emission and absorption is always upheld in a condition of thermodynamic equilibrium.
In the laboratory, black-body radiation is approximated by the radiation from a small hole in a large cavity, a
hohlraum
In radiation thermodynamics, a hohlraum (a non-specific German word for a "hollow space" or "cavity") is a cavity whose walls are in radiative equilibrium with the radiant energy within the cavity. This idealized cavity can be approximated in pra ...
, in an entirely opaque body that is only partly reflective, that is maintained at a constant temperature. (This technique leads to the alternative term ''cavity radiation''.) Any light entering the hole would have to reflect off the walls of the cavity multiple times before it escaped, in which process it is nearly certain to be absorbed. Absorption occurs regardless of the
wavelength
In physics, the wavelength is the spatial period of a periodic wave—the distance over which the wave's shape repeats.
It is the distance between consecutive corresponding points of the same phase on the wave, such as two adjacent crests, t ...
of the radiation entering (as long as it is small compared to the hole). The hole, then, is a close approximation of a theoretical black body and, if the cavity is heated, the
spectrum
A spectrum (plural ''spectra'' or ''spectrums'') is a condition that is not limited to a specific set of values but can vary, without gaps, across a continuum. The word was first used scientifically in optics to describe the rainbow of colors ...
of the hole's radiation (that is, the amount of light emitted from the hole at each wavelength) will be continuous, and will depend only on the temperature and the fact that the walls are opaque and at least partly absorptive, but not on the particular material of which they are built nor on the material in the cavity (compare with
emission spectrum).
The
radiance
In radiometry, radiance is the radiant flux emitted, reflected, transmitted or received by a given surface, per unit solid angle per unit projected area. Radiance is used to characterize diffuse emission and reflection of electromagnetic radiati ...
or observed intensity is not a function of direction. Therefore, a black body is a perfect
Lambertian radiator.
Real objects never behave as full-ideal black bodies, and instead the emitted radiation at a given frequency is a fraction of what the ideal emission would be. The
emissivity
The emissivity of the surface of a material is its effectiveness in emitting energy as thermal radiation. Thermal radiation is electromagnetic radiation that most commonly includes both visible radiation (light) and infrared radiation, which is n ...
of a material specifies how well a real body radiates energy as compared with a black body. This emissivity depends on factors such as temperature, emission angle, and wavelength. However, it is typical in engineering to assume that a surface's spectral emissivity and absorptivity do not depend on wavelength so that the emissivity is a constant. This is known as the ''gray body'' assumption.
![Ilc 9yr moll4096](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3c/Ilc_9yr_moll4096.png)
With non-black surfaces, the deviations from ideal black-body behavior are determined by both the surface structure, such as roughness or granularity, and the chemical composition. On a "per wavelength" basis, real objects in states of
local thermodynamic equilibrium
Thermodynamic equilibrium is an axiomatic concept of thermodynamics. It is an internal state of a single thermodynamic system, or a relation between several thermodynamic systems connected by more or less permeable or impermeable walls. In thermod ...
still follow
Kirchhoff's Law: emissivity equals absorptivity, so that an object that does not absorb all incident light will also emit less radiation than an ideal black body; the incomplete absorption can be due to some of the incident light being transmitted through the body or to some of it being reflected at the surface of the body.
In
astronomy
Astronomy () is a natural science that studies celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and evolution. Objects of interest include planets, moons, stars, nebulae, g ...
, objects such as
stars are frequently regarded as black bodies, though this is often a poor approximation. An almost perfect black-body spectrum is exhibited by the
cosmic microwave background radiation
In Big Bang cosmology the cosmic microwave background (CMB, CMBR) is electromagnetic radiation that is a remnant from an early stage of the universe, also known as "relic radiation". The CMB is faint cosmic background radiation filling all space ...
.
Hawking radiation
Hawking radiation is theoretical black body radiation that is theorized to be released outside a black hole's event horizon because of relativistic quantum effects. It is named after the physicist Stephen Hawking, who developed a theoretical a ...
is the hypothetical black-body radiation emitted by
black holes, at a temperature that depends on the mass, charge, and spin of the hole. If this prediction is correct, black holes will very gradually shrink and evaporate over time as they lose mass by the emission of photons and other particles.
A black body radiates energy at all frequencies, but its intensity rapidly tends to zero at high frequencies (short wavelengths). For example, a black body at room temperature () with one square meter of surface area will emit a photon in the visible range (390–750 nm) at an average rate of one photon every 41 seconds, meaning that, for most practical purposes, such a black body does not emit in the visible range.
The study of the laws of black bodies and the failure of classical physics to describe them helped establish the foundations of
quantum mechanics
Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistr ...
.
Further explanation
According to the Classical Theory of Radiation, if each
Fourier mode of the equilibrium radiation (in an otherwise empty cavity with perfectly reflective walls) is considered as a degree of freedom capable of exchanging energy, then, according to the
equipartition theorem
In classical statistical mechanics, the equipartition theorem relates the temperature of a system to its average energies. The equipartition theorem is also known as the law of equipartition, equipartition of energy, or simply equipartition. T ...
of classical physics, there would be an equal amount of energy in each mode. Since there are an infinite number of modes, this would imply infinite
heat capacity
Heat capacity or thermal capacity is a physical property of matter, defined as the amount of heat to be supplied to an object to produce a unit change in its temperature. The SI unit of heat capacity is joule per kelvin (J/K).
Heat capacity ...
, as well as a nonphysical spectrum of emitted radiation that grows without bound with increasing frequency, a problem known as the
ultraviolet catastrophe
The ultraviolet catastrophe, also called the Rayleigh–Jeans catastrophe, was the prediction of late 19th century/early 20th century classical physics that an ideal black body at thermal equilibrium would emit an unbounded quantity of energy ...
.
In the longer
wavelength
In physics, the wavelength is the spatial period of a periodic wave—the distance over which the wave's shape repeats.
It is the distance between consecutive corresponding points of the same phase on the wave, such as two adjacent crests, t ...
s this deviation is not so noticeable, as
and
are very small. In the shorter wavelengths of the ultraviolet range, however, classical theory predicts the energy emitted tends to infinity, hence the ultraviolet catastrophe. The theory even predicted that all bodies would emit most of their energy in the ultraviolet range, clearly contradicted by the experimental data which showed a different peak wavelength at different temperatures (see also
Wien's law).
![Black body](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/Black_body.svg)
Instead, in the quantum treatment of this problem, the numbers of the energy modes are
quantized, attenuating the spectrum at high frequency in agreement with experimental observation and resolving the catastrophe. The modes that had more energy than the thermal energy of the substance itself were not considered, and because of quantization modes having infinitesimally little energy were excluded.
Thus for shorter wavelengths very few modes (having energy more than
) were allowed, supporting the data that the energy emitted is reduced for wavelengths less than the wavelength of the observed peak of emission.
Notice that there are two factors responsible for the shape of the graph. Firstly, longer wavelengths have a larger number of modes associated with them. Secondly, shorter wavelengths have more energy associated per mode. The two factors combined give the characteristic maximum wavelength.
Calculating the black-body curve was a major challenge in
theoretical physics
Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that employs mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to rationalize, explain and predict natural phenomena. This is in contrast to experimental physics, which uses experim ...
during the late nineteenth century. The problem was solved in 1901 by
Max Planck
Max Karl Ernst Ludwig Planck (, ; 23 April 1858 – 4 October 1947) was a German theoretical physicist whose discovery of energy quanta won him the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1918.
Planck made many substantial contributions to theoretical p ...
in the formalism now known as
Planck's law of black-body radiation. By making changes to
Wien's radiation law
Wien's approximation (also sometimes called Wien's law or the Wien distribution law) is a law of physics used to describe the spectrum of thermal radiation (frequently called the blackbody function). This law was first derived by Wilhelm Wien in ...
(not to be confused with Wien's displacement law) consistent with
thermodynamics
Thermodynamics is a branch of physics that deals with heat, work, and temperature, and their relation to energy, entropy, and the physical properties of matter and radiation. The behavior of these quantities is governed by the four laws of th ...
and
electromagnetism
In physics, electromagnetism is an interaction that occurs between particles with electric charge. It is the second-strongest of the four fundamental interactions, after the strong force, and it is the dominant force in the interactions of ...
, he found a mathematical expression fitting the experimental data satisfactorily. Planck had to assume that the energy of the oscillators in the cavity was quantized, which is to say that it existed in integer multiples of some quantity.
Einstein built on this idea and proposed the quantization of electromagnetic radiation itself in 1905 to explain the
photoelectric effect
The photoelectric effect is the emission of electrons when electromagnetic radiation, such as light, hits a material. Electrons emitted in this manner are called photoelectrons. The phenomenon is studied in condensed matter physics, and solid sta ...
. These theoretical advances eventually resulted in the superseding of classical electromagnetism by
quantum electrodynamics
In particle physics, quantum electrodynamics (QED) is the relativistic quantum field theory of electrodynamics. In essence, it describes how light and matter interact and is the first theory where full agreement between quantum mechanics and spec ...
. These quanta were called
photon
A photon () is an elementary particle that is a quantum of the electromagnetic field, including electromagnetic radiation such as light and radio waves, and the force carrier for the electromagnetic force. Photons are massless, so they a ...
s and the black-body cavity was thought of as containing a
gas of photons. In addition, it led to the development of quantum probability distributions, called
Fermi–Dirac statistics and
Bose–Einstein statistics
In quantum statistics, Bose–Einstein statistics (B–E statistics) describes one of two possible ways in which a collection of non-interacting, indistinguishable particles may occupy a set of available discrete energy states at thermodynamic ...
, each applicable to a different class of particles,
fermions and
boson
In particle physics, a boson ( ) is a subatomic particle whose spin quantum number has an integer value (0,1,2 ...). Bosons form one of the two fundamental classes of subatomic particle, the other being fermions, which have odd half-integer spi ...
s.
The wavelength at which the radiation is strongest is given by Wien's displacement law, and the overall power emitted per unit area is given by the
Stefan–Boltzmann law
The Stefan–Boltzmann law describes the power radiated from a black body in terms of its temperature. Specifically, the Stefan–Boltzmann law states that the total energy radiated per unit surface area of a black body across all wavelengths ...
. So, as temperature increases, the glow color changes from red to yellow to white to blue. Even as the peak wavelength moves into the ultra-violet, enough radiation continues to be emitted in the blue wavelengths that the body will continue to appear blue. It will never become invisible—indeed, the radiation of visible light increases
monotonically with temperature.
The Stefan–Boltzmann law also says that the total radiant heat energy emitted from a surface is proportional to the fourth power of its
absolute temperature
Thermodynamic temperature is a quantity defined in thermodynamics as distinct from kinetic theory or statistical mechanics.
Historically, thermodynamic temperature was defined by Kelvin in terms of a macroscopic relation between thermodynamic w ...
. The law was formulated by Josef Stefan in 1879 and later derived by Ludwig Boltzmann. The formula is given, where ''E'' is the radiant heat emitted from a unit of area per unit time, ''T'' is the absolute temperature, and is the
Stefan–Boltzmann constant
The Stefan–Boltzmann constant (also Stefan's constant), a physical constant denoted by the Greek letter ''σ'' (sigma), is the constant of proportionality in the Stefan–Boltzmann law: "the total intensity radiated over all wavelengths inc ...
.
Equations
Planck's law of black-body radiation
Planck's law states that
:
where
:
is the spectral radiance (the
power
Power most often refers to:
* Power (physics), meaning "rate of doing work"
** Engine power, the power put out by an engine
** Electric power
* Power (social and political), the ability to influence people or events
** Abusive power
Power may a ...
per unit
solid angle
In geometry, a solid angle (symbol: ) is a measure of the amount of the field of view from some particular point that a given object covers. That is, it is a measure of how large the object appears to an observer looking from that point.
The poi ...
and per unit of area normal to the propagation) density of frequency
radiation per unit
frequency
Frequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit of time. It is also occasionally referred to as ''temporal frequency'' for clarity, and is distinct from ''angular frequency''. Frequency is measured in hertz (Hz) which is eq ...
at thermal equilibrium at temperature
. Units: power /
rea * solid angle * frequency
:
is the
Planck constant
The Planck constant, or Planck's constant, is a fundamental physical constant of foundational importance in quantum mechanics. The constant gives the relationship between the energy of a photon and its frequency, and by the mass-energy equivale ...
;
:
is the
speed of light
The speed of light in vacuum, commonly denoted , is a universal physical constant that is important in many areas of physics. The speed of light is exactly equal to ). According to the special theory of relativity, is the upper limit ...
in a vacuum;
:
is the
Boltzmann constant
The Boltzmann constant ( or ) is the proportionality factor that relates the average relative kinetic energy of particles in a gas with the thermodynamic temperature of the gas. It occurs in the definitions of the kelvin and the gas constant, ...
;
:
is the
frequency
Frequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit of time. It is also occasionally referred to as ''temporal frequency'' for clarity, and is distinct from ''angular frequency''. Frequency is measured in hertz (Hz) which is eq ...
of the electromagnetic radiation;
:
is the absolute
temperature
Temperature is a physical quantity that expresses quantitatively the perceptions of hotness and coldness. Temperature is measurement, measured with a thermometer.
Thermometers are calibrated in various Conversion of units of temperature, temp ...
of the body.
For a black body surface, the spectral radiance density (defined per unit of area normal to the propagation) is independent of the angle
of emission with respect to the normal. However, this means that, following
Lambert's cosine law
In optics, Lambert's cosine law says that the radiant intensity or luminous intensity observed from an ideal diffusely reflecting surface or ideal diffuse radiator is directly proportional to the cosine of the angle ''θ'' between the directi ...
,
is the radiance density per unit area of emitting surface as the surface area involved in generating the radiance is increased by a factor
with respect to an area normal to the propagation direction. At oblique angles, the solid angle spans involved do get smaller, resulting in lower aggregate intensities.
Wien's displacement law
Wien's displacement law shows how the spectrum of black-body radiation at any temperature is related to the spectrum at any other temperature. If we know the shape of the spectrum at one temperature, we can calculate the shape at any other temperature. Spectral intensity can be expressed as a function of wavelength or of frequency.
A consequence of Wien's displacement law is that the wavelength at which the intensity ''per unit wavelength'' of the radiation produced by a black body has a local maximum or peak,
, is a function only of the temperature:
:
where the constant ''b'', known as Wien's displacement constant, is equal to
(where
is the
Lambert W function
In mathematics, the Lambert function, also called the omega function or product logarithm, is a multivalued function, namely the branches of the converse relation of the function , where is any complex number and is the exponential function ...
). So approximately
equals 2898 um/T(K). At a typical room temperature of 293 K (20 °C), the maximum intensity is at .
Planck's law was also stated above as a function of frequency. The intensity maximum for this is given by
:
.
In unitless form, the maximum occurs when
, where
. The approximate numerical solution is
. At a typical room temperature of 293 K (20 °C), the maximum intensity is for .
Stefan–Boltzmann law
By integrating
over the frequency the radiance
(units: power /
rea * solid angle) is
:
by using
with
and with
being the
Stefan–Boltzmann constant
The Stefan–Boltzmann constant (also Stefan's constant), a physical constant denoted by the Greek letter ''σ'' (sigma), is the constant of proportionality in the Stefan–Boltzmann law: "the total intensity radiated over all wavelengths inc ...
.
On a side note, at a distance d, the intensity
per area
of radiating surface is the useful expression
:
when the receiving surface is perpendicular to the radiation.
By subsequently integrating
over the solid angle
for all azimuthal angle (0 to
) and polar angle
from 0 to
, we arrive at the
Stefan–Boltzmann law
The Stefan–Boltzmann law describes the power radiated from a black body in terms of its temperature. Specifically, the Stefan–Boltzmann law states that the total energy radiated per unit surface area of a black body across all wavelengths ...
: the power ''j''* emitted per unit area of the surface of a black body is directly proportional to the fourth power of its absolute temperature:
:
We used
:
Applications
Human-body emission
The human body radiates energy as
infrared
Infrared (IR), sometimes called infrared light, is electromagnetic radiation (EMR) with wavelengths longer than those of visible light. It is therefore invisible to the human eye. IR is generally understood to encompass wavelengths from around ...
light. The net power radiated is the difference between the power emitted and the power absorbed:
:
Applying the Stefan–Boltzmann law,
:
where ''A'' and ''T'' are the body surface area and temperature,
is the
emissivity
The emissivity of the surface of a material is its effectiveness in emitting energy as thermal radiation. Thermal radiation is electromagnetic radiation that most commonly includes both visible radiation (light) and infrared radiation, which is n ...
, and ''T''
0 is the ambient temperature.
The total surface area of an adult is about 2 m
2, and the mid- and far-infrared
emissivity
The emissivity of the surface of a material is its effectiveness in emitting energy as thermal radiation. Thermal radiation is electromagnetic radiation that most commonly includes both visible radiation (light) and infrared radiation, which is n ...
of skin and most clothing is near unity, as it is for most nonmetallic surfaces. Skin temperature is about 33 °C, but clothing reduces the surface temperature to about 28 °C when the ambient temperature is 20 °C. Hence, the net radiative heat loss is about
:
The total energy radiated in one day is about 8
MJ, or 2000 kcal (food
calories).
Basal metabolic rate
Basal metabolic rate (BMR) is the rate of energy expenditure per unit time by endothermic animals at rest. It is reported in energy units per unit time ranging from watt (joule/second) to ml O2/min or joule per hour per kg body mass J/(h·kg). Pro ...
for a 40-year-old male is about 35 kcal/(m
2·h),
which is equivalent to 1700 kcal per day, assuming the same 2 m
2 area. However, the mean metabolic rate of sedentary adults is about 50% to 70% greater than their basal rate.
There are other important thermal loss mechanisms, including
convection
Convection is single or multiphase fluid flow that occurs spontaneously due to the combined effects of material property heterogeneity and body forces on a fluid, most commonly density and gravity (see buoyancy). When the cause of the conve ...
and
evaporation. Conduction is negligible – the
Nusselt number
In thermal fluid dynamics, the Nusselt number (, after Wilhelm Nusselt) is the ratio of convective to conductive heat transfer at a boundary in a fluid. Convection includes both advection (fluid motion) and diffusion (conduction). The conductiv ...
is much greater than unity. Evaporation by
perspiration
Perspiration, also known as sweating, is the production of fluids secreted by the sweat glands in the skin of mammals.
Two types of sweat glands can be found in humans: eccrine glands and apocrine glands. The eccrine sweat glands are distr ...
is only required if radiation and convection are insufficient to maintain a steady-state temperature (but evaporation from the lungs occurs regardless). Free-convection rates are comparable, albeit somewhat lower, than radiative rates. Thus, radiation accounts for about two-thirds of thermal energy loss in cool, still air. Given the approximate nature of many of the assumptions, this can only be taken as a crude estimate. Ambient air motion, causing forced convection, or evaporation reduces the relative importance of radiation as a thermal-loss mechanism.
Application of
Wien's law to human-body emission results in a peak wavelength of
:
For this reason, thermal imaging devices for human subjects are most sensitive in the 7–14 micrometer range.
Temperature relation between a planet and its star
The black-body law may be used to estimate the temperature of a planet orbiting the Sun.
The temperature of a planet depends on several factors:
*Incident radiation from its star
*Emitted radiation of the planet (for example,
Earth's infrared glow)
*The
albedo
Albedo (; ) is the measure of the diffuse reflection of solar radiation out of the total solar radiation and measured on a scale from 0, corresponding to a black body that absorbs all incident radiation, to 1, corresponding to a body that refl ...
effect causing a fraction of light to be reflected by the planet
*The
greenhouse effect
The greenhouse effect is a process that occurs when energy from a planet's host star goes through the planet's atmosphere and heats the planet's surface, but greenhouse gases in the atmosphere prevent some of the heat from returning directly ...
for planets with an atmosphere
*Energy generated internally by a planet itself due to
radioactive decay,
tidal heating
Tidal heating (also known as tidal working or tidal flexing) occurs through the tidal friction processes: orbital and rotational energy is dissipated as heat in either (or both) the surface ocean or interior of a planet or satellite. When an objec ...
, and
adiabatic contraction due to cooling.
The analysis only considers the Sun's heat for a planet in a Solar System.
The
Stefan–Boltzmann law
The Stefan–Boltzmann law describes the power radiated from a black body in terms of its temperature. Specifically, the Stefan–Boltzmann law states that the total energy radiated per unit surface area of a black body across all wavelengths ...
gives the total
power
Power most often refers to:
* Power (physics), meaning "rate of doing work"
** Engine power, the power put out by an engine
** Electric power
* Power (social and political), the ability to influence people or events
** Abusive power
Power may a ...
(energy/second) that the Sun emits:
:
where
:
is the
Stefan–Boltzmann constant
The Stefan–Boltzmann constant (also Stefan's constant), a physical constant denoted by the Greek letter ''σ'' (sigma), is the constant of proportionality in the Stefan–Boltzmann law: "the total intensity radiated over all wavelengths inc ...
,
:
is the effective temperature of the Sun, and
:
is the radius of the Sun.
The Sun emits that power equally in all directions. Because of this, the planet is hit with only a tiny fraction of it. The power from the Sun that strikes the planet (at the top of the atmosphere) is:
:
where
:
is the radius of the planet, and
:
is the distance between the
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core. The Sun radiates this energy mainly as light, ultraviolet, and infrared radi ...
and the planet.
Because of its high temperature, the Sun emits to a large extent in the ultraviolet and visible (UV-Vis) frequency range. In this frequency range, the planet reflects a fraction
of this energy where
is the
albedo
Albedo (; ) is the measure of the diffuse reflection of solar radiation out of the total solar radiation and measured on a scale from 0, corresponding to a black body that absorbs all incident radiation, to 1, corresponding to a body that refl ...
or reflectance of the planet in the UV-Vis range. In other words, the planet absorbs a fraction
of the Sun's light, and reflects the rest. The power absorbed by the planet and its atmosphere is then:
:
Even though the planet only absorbs as a circular area
, it emits in all directions; the spherical surface area being
. If the planet were a perfect black body, it would emit according to the
Stefan–Boltzmann law
The Stefan–Boltzmann law describes the power radiated from a black body in terms of its temperature. Specifically, the Stefan–Boltzmann law states that the total energy radiated per unit surface area of a black body across all wavelengths ...
:
where
is the temperature of the planet. This temperature, calculated for the case of the planet acting as a black body by setting
, is known as the
effective temperature. The actual temperature of the planet will likely be different, depending on its surface and atmospheric properties. Ignoring the atmosphere and greenhouse effect, the planet, since it is at a much lower temperature than the Sun, emits mostly in the infrared (IR) portion of the spectrum. In this frequency range, it emits
of the radiation that a black body would emit where
is the average emissivity in the IR range. The power emitted by the planet is then:
:
For a body in
radiative exchange equilibrium with its surroundings, the rate at which it emits
radiant energy
Radiant may refer to:
Computers, software, and video games
* Radiant (software), a content management system
* GtkRadiant, a level editor created by id Software for their games
* Radiant AI, a technology developed by Bethesda Softworks for '' ...
is equal to the rate at which it absorbs it:
:
Substituting the expressions for solar and planet power in equations 1–6 and simplifying yields the estimated temperature of the planet, ignoring greenhouse effect, ''T''
P:
:
In other words, given the assumptions made, the temperature of a planet depends only on the surface temperature of the Sun, the radius of the Sun, the distance between the planet and the Sun, the albedo and the IR emissivity of the planet.
Notice that a gray (flat spectrum) ball where
comes to the same temperature as a black body no matter how dark or light gray.
Effective temperature of Earth
Substituting the measured values for the Sun and Earth yields:
:
[NASA Sun Fact Sheet](_blank)
/ref>
:
:
:
With the average emissivity set to unity, the effective temperature of the Earth is:
:
or −18.8 °C.
This is the temperature of the Earth if it radiated as a perfect black body in the infrared, assuming an unchanging albedo and ignoring greenhouse effect
The greenhouse effect is a process that occurs when energy from a planet's host star goes through the planet's atmosphere and heats the planet's surface, but greenhouse gases in the atmosphere prevent some of the heat from returning directly ...
s (which can raise the surface temperature of a body above what it would be if it were a perfect black body in all spectrums). The Earth in fact radiates not quite as a perfect black body in the infrared which will raise the estimated temperature a few degrees above the effective temperature. If we wish to estimate what the temperature of the Earth would be if it had no atmosphere, then we could take the albedo and emissivity of the Moon as a good estimate. The albedo and emissivity of the Moon are about 0.1054 and 0.95 respectively, yielding an estimated temperature of about 1.36 °C.
Estimates of the Earth's average albedo vary in the range 0.3–0.4, resulting in different estimated effective temperatures. Estimates are often based on the solar constant (total insolation power density) rather than the temperature, size, and distance of the Sun. For example, using 0.4 for albedo, and an insolation of 1400 W m−2, one obtains an effective temperature of about 245 K.
Similarly using albedo 0.3 and solar constant of 1372 W m−2, one obtains an effective temperature of 255 K.
Cosmology
The cosmic microwave background
In Big Bang cosmology the cosmic microwave background (CMB, CMBR) is electromagnetic radiation that is a remnant from an early stage of the universe, also known as "relic radiation". The CMB is faint cosmic background radiation filling all spac ...
radiation observed today is the most perfect black-body radiation ever observed in nature, with a temperature of about 2.7 K. It is a "snapshot" of the radiation at the time of decoupling between matter and radiation in the early universe. Prior to this time, most matter in the universe was in the form of an ionized plasma in thermal, though not full thermodynamic, equilibrium with radiation.
According to Kondepudi and Prigogine, at very high temperatures (above 1010 K; such temperatures existed in the very early universe), where the thermal motion separates protons and neutrons in spite of the strong nuclear forces, electron-positron pairs appear and disappear spontaneously and are in thermal equilibrium with electromagnetic radiation. These particles form a part of the black body spectrum, in addition to the electromagnetic radiation.
History
In his first memoir, Augustin-Jean Fresnel
Augustin-Jean Fresnel (10 May 1788 – 14 July 1827) was a French civil engineer and physicist whose research in optics led to the almost unanimous acceptance of the wave theory of light, excluding any remnant of Newton's corpuscular th ...
(1788–1827) responded to a view he extracted from a French translation of Isaac Newton
Sir Isaac Newton (25 December 1642 – 20 March 1726/27) was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author (described in his time as a " natural philosopher"), widely recognised as one of the grea ...
's ''Optics
Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behaviour and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behaviour of visible, ultrav ...
''. He says that Newton imagined particles of light traversing space uninhibited by the caloric medium filling it, and refutes this view (never actually held by Newton) by saying that a black body under illumination would increase indefinitely in heat.
Balfour Stewart
In 1858, Balfour Stewart
Balfour Stewart (1 November 182819 December 1887) was a Scottish physicist and meteorologist.
His studies in the field of radiant heat led to him receiving the Rumford Medal of the Royal Society in 1868. In 1859 he was appointed director of K ...
described his experiments on the thermal radiative emissive and absorptive powers of polished plates of various substances, compared with the powers of lamp-black surfaces, at the same temperature. Stewart chose lamp-black surfaces as his reference because of various previous experimental findings, especially those of Pierre Prevost and of John Leslie. He wrote, "Lamp-black, which absorbs all the rays that fall upon it, and therefore possesses the greatest possible absorbing power, will possess also the greatest possible radiating power." More an experimenter than a logician, Stewart failed to point out that his statement presupposed an abstract general principle: that there exist, either ideally in theory, or really in nature, bodies or surfaces that respectively have one and the same unique universal greatest possible absorbing power, likewise for radiating power, for every wavelength and equilibrium temperature.
Stewart measured radiated power with a thermopile
A thermopile is an electronic device that converts thermal energy into electrical energy. It is composed of several thermocouples connected usually in series or, less commonly, in parallel. Such a device works on the principle of the thermoele ...
and sensitive galvanometer read with a microscope. He was concerned with selective thermal radiation, which he investigated with plates of substances that radiated and absorbed selectively for different qualities of radiation rather than maximally for all qualities of radiation. He discussed the experiments in terms of rays which could be reflected and refracted, and which obeyed the Stokes-Helmholtz reciprocity
The Helmholtz reciprocity principle describes how a ray of light and its reverse ray encounter matched optical adventures, such as reflections, refractions, and absorptions in a passive medium, or at an interface. It does not apply to moving, non ...
principle (though he did not use an eponym for it). He did not in this paper mention that the qualities of the rays might be described by their wavelengths, nor did he use spectrally resolving apparatus such as prisms or diffraction gratings. His work was quantitative within these constraints. He made his measurements in a room temperature environment, and quickly so as to catch his bodies in a condition near the thermal equilibrium in which they had been prepared by heating to equilibrium with boiling water. His measurements confirmed that substances that emit and absorb selectively respect the principle of selective equality of emission and absorption at thermal equilibrium.
Stewart offered a theoretical proof that this should be the case separately for every selected quality of thermal radiation, but his mathematics was not rigorously valid. He made no mention of thermodynamics in this paper, though he did refer to conservation of ''vis viva
''Vis viva'' (from the Latin for "living force") is a historical term used for the first recorded description of what we now call kinetic energy in an early formulation of the principle of conservation of energy.
Overview
Proposed by Gottfried L ...
''. He proposed that his measurements implied that radiation was both absorbed and emitted by particles of matter throughout depths of the media in which it propagated. He applied the Helmholtz reciprocity principle to account for the material interface processes as distinct from the processes in the interior material. He did not postulate unrealizable perfectly black surfaces. He concluded that his experiments showed that in a cavity in thermal equilibrium, the heat radiated from any part of the interior bounding surface, no matter of what material it might be composed, was the same as would have been emitted from a surface of the same shape and position that would have been composed of lamp-black. He did not state explicitly that the lamp-black-coated bodies that he used as reference must have had a unique common spectral emittance function that depended on temperature in a unique way.
Gustav Kirchhoff
In 1859, not knowing of Stewart's work, Gustav Kirchhoff, Gustav Robert Kirchhoff reported the coincidence of the wavelengths of spectrally resolved lines of absorption and of emission of visible light. Importantly for thermal physics, he also observed that bright lines or dark lines were apparent depending on the temperature difference between emitter and absorber.
Kirchhoff then went on to consider some bodies that emit and absorb heat radiation, in an opaque enclosure or cavity, in equilibrium at temperature .
Here is used a notation different from Kirchhoff's. Here, the emitting power denotes a dimensioned quantity, the total radiation emitted by a body labeled by index at temperature . The total absorption ratio of that body is dimensionless, the ratio of absorbed to incident radiation in the cavity at temperature . (In contrast with Balfour Stewart's, Kirchhoff's definition of his absorption ratio did not refer in particular to a lamp-black surface as the source of the incident radiation.) Thus the ratio of emitting power to absorptivity is a dimensioned quantity, with the dimensions of emitting power, because is dimensionless. Also here the wavelength-specific emitting power of the body at temperature is denoted by and the wavelength-specific absorption ratio by . Again, the ratio of emitting power to absorptivity is a dimensioned quantity, with the dimensions of emitting power.
In a second report made in 1859, Kirchhoff announced a new general principle or law for which he offered a theoretical and mathematical proof, though he did not offer quantitative measurements of radiation powers. His theoretical proof was and still is considered by some writers to be invalid. His principle, however, has endured: it was that for heat rays of the same wavelength, in equilibrium at a given temperature, the wavelength-specific ratio of emitting power to absorptivity has one and the same common value for all bodies that emit and absorb at that wavelength. In symbols, the law stated that the wavelength-specific ratio has one and the same value for all bodies, which is to say for all values of index . In this report there was no mention of black bodies.
In 1860, still not knowing of Stewart's measurements for selected qualities of radiation, Kirchhoff pointed out that it was long established experimentally that for total heat radiation, of unselected quality, emitted and absorbed by a body in equilibrium, the dimensioned total radiation ratio , has one and the same value common to all bodies, which is to say for every value of the material index . Again without measurements of radiative powers or other new experimental data, Kirchhoff then offered a fresh theoretical proof of his new principle of the universality of the value of the wavelength-specific ratio at thermal equilibrium. His fresh theoretical proof was and still is considered by some writers to be invalid.
But more importantly, it relied on a new theoretical postulate of "perfectly black bodies," which is the reason why one speaks of Kirchhoff's law. Such black bodies showed complete absorption in their infinitely thin most superficial surface. They correspond to Balfour Stewart's reference bodies, with internal radiation, coated with lamp-black. They were not the more realistic perfectly black bodies later considered by Planck. Planck's black bodies radiated and absorbed only by the material in their interiors; their interfaces with contiguous media were only mathematical surfaces, capable neither of absorption nor emission, but only of reflecting and transmitting with refraction.
Kirchhoff's proof considered an arbitrary non-ideal body labeled as well as various perfect black bodies labeled . It required that the bodies be kept in a cavity in thermal equilibrium at temperature . His proof intended to show that the ratio was independent of the nature of the non-ideal body, however partly transparent or partly reflective it was.
His proof first argued that for wavelength and at temperature , at thermal equilibrium, all perfectly black bodies of the same size and shape have the one and the same common value of emissive power , with the dimensions of power. His proof noted that the dimensionless wavelength-specific absorptivity of a perfectly black body is by definition exactly 1. Then for a perfectly black body, the wavelength-specific ratio of emissive power to absorptivity is again just , with the dimensions of power. Kirchhoff considered, successively, thermal equilibrium with the arbitrary non-ideal body, and with a perfectly black body of the same size and shape, in place in his cavity in equilibrium at temperature . He argued that the flows of heat radiation must be the same in each case. Thus he argued that at thermal equilibrium the ratio was equal to , which may now be denoted , a continuous function, dependent only on at fixed temperature , and an increasing function of at fixed wavelength , at low temperatures vanishing for visible but not for longer wavelengths, with positive values for visible wavelengths at higher temperatures, which does not depend on the nature of the arbitrary non-ideal body. (Geometrical factors, taken into detailed account by Kirchhoff, have been ignored in the foregoing.)
Thus Kirchhoff's law of thermal radiation
In heat transfer, Kirchhoff's law of thermal radiation refers to wavelength-specific radiative emission and absorption by a material body in thermodynamic equilibrium, including radiative exchange equilibrium. It is a special case of Onsage ...
can be stated: ''For any material at all, radiating and absorbing in thermodynamic equilibrium at any given temperature , for every wavelength , the ratio of emissive power to absorptivity has one universal value, which is characteristic of a perfect black body, and is an emissive power which we here represent by .'' (For our notation , Kirchhoff's original notation was simply .)
Kirchhoff announced that the determination of the function was a problem of the highest importance, though he recognized that there would be experimental difficulties to be overcome. He supposed that like other functions that do not depend on the properties of individual bodies, it would be a simple function. Occasionally by historians that function has been called "Kirchhoff's (emission, universal) function," though its precise mathematical form would not be known for another forty years, till it was discovered by Planck in 1900. The theoretical proof for Kirchhoff's universality principle was worked on and debated by various physicists over the same time, and later. Kirchhoff stated later in 1860 that his theoretical proof was better than Balfour Stewart's, and in some respects it was so. Kirchhoff's 1860 paper did not mention the second law of thermodynamics, and of course did not mention the concept of entropy which had not at that time been established. In a more considered account in a book in 1862, Kirchhoff mentioned the connection of his law with Carnot's theorem (thermodynamics), Carnot's principle, which is a form of the second law.
According to Helge Kragh, "Quantum theory owes its origin to the study of thermal radiation, in particular to the "black-body" radiation that Robert Kirchhoff had first defined in 1859–1860."
Doppler effect
The relativistic Doppler effect causes a shift in the frequency ''f'' of light originating from a source that is moving in relation to the observer, so that the wave is observed to have frequency ''f:
:
where ''v'' is the velocity of the source in the observer's rest frame, ''θ'' is the angle between the velocity vector and the observer-source direction measured in the reference frame of the source, and ''c'' is the speed of light
The speed of light in vacuum, commonly denoted , is a universal physical constant that is important in many areas of physics. The speed of light is exactly equal to ). According to the special theory of relativity, is the upper limit ...
.[The Doppler Effect, T. P. Gill, Logos Press, 1965] This can be simplified for the special cases of objects moving directly towards (''θ'' = π) or away (''θ'' = 0) from the observer, and for speeds much less than ''c''.
Through Planck's law the temperature spectrum of a black body is proportionally related to the frequency of light and one may substitute the temperature (''T'') for the frequency in this equation.
For the case of a source moving directly towards or away from the observer, this reduces to
:
Here ''v'' > 0 indicates a receding source, and ''v'' < 0 indicates an approaching source.
This is an important effect in astronomy, where the velocities of stars and galaxies can reach significant fractions of ''c''. An example is found in the cosmic microwave background radiation
In Big Bang cosmology the cosmic microwave background (CMB, CMBR) is electromagnetic radiation that is a remnant from an early stage of the universe, also known as "relic radiation". The CMB is faint cosmic background radiation filling all space ...
, which exhibits a dipole anisotropy from the Earth's motion relative to this black-body radiation field.
See also
* Bolometer
* Color temperature
* Infrared thermometer
* Photon polarization
* Planck's law
* Pyrometer
* Rayleigh–Jeans law
* Thermography
* Sakuma–Hattori equation
* Terahertz radiation
* Draper point The Draper point is the approximate temperature above which almost all solid materials visibly glow as a result of blackbody radiation. It was established at 977 °F (525 °C, 798 K) by John William Draper in 1847.
Bodies at tempera ...
References
Bibliography
*
*
* a translation of ''Frühgeschichte der Quantentheorie (1899–1913)'', Physik Verlag, Mosbach/Baden.
*
*
* Translated by Guthrie, F. as
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
*
*
External links
Black-body radiation JavaScript Interactives
Black-body radiation by Fu-Kwun Hwang and Loo Kang Wee
Interactive calculator with Doppler Effect. Includes most systems of units.
Color-to-Temperature demonstration
at Academo.org
– From Hyperphysics
"Blackbody Spectrum"
by Jeff Bryant, Wolfram Demonstrations Project, 2007.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Black Body
Infrared
Heat transfer
Electromagnetic radiation
Astrophysics