the.com/spectrometry
Weighing light to tell matter's secrets, no scale required.
means A technique that splits light (or matter) into its component parts to measure wavelengths, masses, or energies, revealing what something is made of.
from Built from Latin 'spectrum' (an appearance or image, from 'specere,' to look or behold) and Greek '-metria' (measurement). 'Spectrum' entered scientific English through optics — Newton used it for the band of colors cast by a prism — before the word's reach widened to cover any range of related things. Bolt on the measuring suffix and you get a 19th-century compound built for a new kind of science: one that doesn't look at matter directly, but reads the light it gives off or absorbs, like a fingerprint cast in color.
- core trick
- splits light into wavelengths like a very precise rainbow
- used for
- identifies elements in stars without ever touching them
- mass version
- weighs molecules by smashing and sorting ion fragments
- forensic use
- catches dopers and poisoners from trace molecular fingerprints