I made the post last night just before I went to bed. I made a comment to Jake about photoluminescence being kinda interesting. Being tired, one would think I'd go right to sleep as soon as I hit the pillow. But no! My brain just kept echo-ing and re echo-ing the damn word back and forth in my head. I got to thinking, I know what that means. Somewhere in the dark regions of my cranium there lurks the answer. Hmmmm. Photo. Means pictures, right? Luminescence means shiny things or light, right? Hmmmmm. Pictures of light. No don't seem the right thing. Hmmmmm. Fireflies have a shine. No that's phosphorescence. Minerals glow in the dark under a black light. No that's florescence. Finally Bingo!! Sometimes when you put some minerals under a black light then turn it off, the darn things will still glow. Sometimes when you subject some minerals to a strong light then turn it off they will glow. Right? That I think is photoluminescence. Gonna have to drag out the old mineral book and check to make sure. This was my final thought about 2:30 last night when I last looked at the clock. Any way this AM, I am still a bit groggy from listening to brain echos most of the night. Good thing it's not today that we have to take a party out to Date creek to get crystals, That's tomorrow. Wonder if he will have a brand new mustang convertible like the last folks we took out there had.
Granny
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Whoops..... I should have read these posts in order! I posted the last comment without reading this post. Yep you got it, PL is just like some of the black light mineral displays at museums. Except I'm not using a UV light I'm using laser light at wavelengths of 458 (purply blue) and 633 (red). A detector picks up the "luminescing" light and tells ya how much light at what wavelength is coming off of your sample, this is called a spectra. Some folks look at their spectra and say "gadzooks! I've made brilliant discovery!" I look at my spectra and think "WTF!! this doesn't show me what I was hoping and now I have to come up with an explanation for this garbage!" Oh well I'm creative, I'll come up with something.
Hey I got an idea! How about I make a post about some of my crappy PL spectra and folks can give me their take on it. I'll consider ANY EXPLANATION if it's good I just may pull it out at my defense! I can see it now...... I'm in front of my committee and they proceed to tear into me about my results, but before they get to far I'll hold up my hand and say..
"whoaa.... hold on a minute..... as you can clearly see this is convincing evidence of wood sprites! or perhaps an impending alien invasion"
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