#x-rays

[nemfrog]

"Normal lumbar spine and pelvis." Radiography and radio-therapeutics. 1917.

Internet Archive

[mapsontheweb]

Röntgen rays or X-rays?

[drnikolatesla]

X-Ray Image Taken By Nikola Tesla (1896)

Though not widely known, Nikola Tesla spent a great deal of time intensively researching X-rays, publishing his results during the period between March 11, 1896 to August 11, 1897. He also gave a lecture on April 6, 1897 presenting designs of several different devices that could generate these powerful rays. During this lecture, he shared similar data and conclusions from his earlier experiments with Crookes tubes in 1894. Crookes tubes were invented by British scientist William Crookes in order to study electrical discharges in vacuum tubes. During Tesla’s experiments in 1894, he observed that some of the tubes that produced only feeble visible light had more effect on photographic plates than tubes which were brighter. Since it was obvious that there must be some kind of energy coming from the tubes with feeble light, and their properties were still unknown, Tesla used the term “radiant matter" to describe these radiations. With these tubes, Tesla produced some of the first X-ray imaging, which he called “shadowgraphs,” due to their dark nature, but still did not realize the importance of these radiations. To him, the photographs taken seemed to be spoiled due to unaccountable marks and defects. In March of 1895, a fire broke out in his laboratory, destroying practically all of his equipment and experimental data to date. It took several months before he could resume his work, and in the meantime, a German scientist named Wilhelm Röntgen made his X-ray discovery in the same year (December, 1895). Roentgen first detected the radiation by accident in his experiments where he was testing whether cathode rays emitted from Crookes tubes could pass through glass, and or other solid objects, but was astonished to find that the rays emitted would pass through thinner objects and leave shadows of the more solid objects behind (such as with skin and bones). When Tesla heard this news, it was immediately obvious to him what had been problematic in his laboratory work. Realizing and regretting that he had missed out on making a major scientific discovery, Tesla would say, “I realized that my guiding spirit had again prompted me and that I had failed to comprehend his mysterious signs.” He repeated Röntgen's experiments, and came to much better results than Röntgen and others since he had his newly developed Tesla Coil. With this apparatus, he immediately realized the importance of high voltages for producing powerful rays and suggested using his newly developed single-terminal tubes and connecting them to the secondary coil of the transformer. In 1896, Röntgen acknowledged Tesla’s discoveries and in a lecture before the Physical Medical Society in Wurzburg, Germany, discussed the advantage of using Tesla’s high-frequency transformer in generating X-rays. Tesla would also become one of the first scientists to point out the harms of these rays and developed safer ways to utilize them for medical use. Methods we still use today. On the other side of town, others like Thomas Edison thought these newly discovered rays could cure the blind. Many patients who were experimented upon starting showing terrible illnesses, one being his assistant who later had to have both arms amputated. Edison was quoted in an interview saying, “Don’t talk to me about X-rays…I am afraid of them.”

Nikola Tesla would later give all credit to Röntgen for the discovery, and throughout the next few years, produced some of the best X-ray imaging that even Röntgen praised. In a letter to Tesla, Röntgen wrote, “Dear Sir! You have surprised me tremendously with the beautiful photographs of wonderful discharges, and I tell you thank you very much for that. If only I knew how you make such things!”

[mindblowingscience]

The search for life beyond Earth dutifully continues. Astronomers using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, as well as the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton, are contributing some new research to the hunt — and hoping to lay the groundwork for future projects. The researchers are using Chandra to study radiation emitted from nearby stars to establish whether or not an exoplanet orbiting those stars could be habitable. X-rays and ultraviolet light could, at high-enough levels, damage an exoplanet's atmosphere, reducing the possibility of supporting life (as we know it, anyway).

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[fbwzoo]

First x-ray was October 2023. Second x-ray was March 2024.

We found his bones!!!!

Ed's bloodwork came back all in normal ranges too, and his broken leg has healed! Metabolic bone disease can't really be "fixed", but we've absolutely stopped the progression. His bones are still a little soft, and his growth was stunted, so he'll stay smaller in size. But he's come SO far and the vet was as thrilled as us with his progress!

Looking forward to many hopefully healthy years with this boy now.

[lavender-is-a-killer]

Throwback to when I got a sinus xray and they didn’t make me take out my piercings bc there was no magnetic risk.

[testure-1988]

X-rays of my feet, from when my right foot was fractured

[gothabilly-kitty]

Lingerie by Fantasmagoria

[slack-wise]

Manuel Alvarez Bravo

[dailyunsolvedmysteries]

52-year-old Margaret Daalman, whose x ray is above, swallowed 78 pieces of cutlery.

[livingforstars]

X-Raying the Moon - August 31st, 1995.

"Above is a picture of the Moon taken in X-rays by the Roentgen Observatory Satellite ROSAT in 1990. This famous picture shows three distinct regions: a bright X-ray sky, a bright part of the Moon, and a relatively dark part of the Moon. The bright X-ray region is exemplary of the mysterious X-ray background that is seen everywhere in the sky. The bright lunar crescent shines because it reflects X-rays emitted by the Sun. The dark lunar face is surprising because it is not completely dark, and its slight emission is thought to result from energetic particles from the solar wind striking the Moon."

[arctic-hands]

Tfw the ER doc says you've had more x-rays and CT scans in the past twelve months at this hospital alone (you frequent more than one hospital) than most people have their entire lives and at this point they'll prolly never x-ray you again unless they think you're actively dying, but that just means the pain on the wrong side for your Crohn's disase has gone unexplained and you still have to schedule a bone-density scan in the next few weeks because of other health reasons like

[Image Description: the MS Paint meme doodle of a simplistic person with no hair and half-open eyes that are looking downward, with an exhausted smile as they simply say "yea". End I.D.]

[bpod-bpod]

Artificial Knees

The x-rays of osteoarthritic human knees on the top row are entirely fake – a research team generated them using an artificially intelligent algorithm – while those on the bottom row are genuine. Or, wait, is it the other way around? The point is, it’s impossible to tell, even for medical experts. Why have scientists gone to the effort of creating fake X-rays, you might ask. Rest assured, there’s more to it than simply trying to fool orthopaedic doctors. Having access to large amounts of patient data can be extremely useful for developing diagnostic, classification, and educational tools, but sharing genuine medical data can be a highly bureaucratic process. The idea, then, is that if AI can generate fake data of such high quality as to be indistinguishable from real patient data, it could be used to help build valuable tools without the hassle of untangling all the red tape.

Written by Ruth Williams

Image from work by Fabi Prezja and colleagues

Faculty of Information Technology, University of Jyväskylä, Jyväskylä, Finland

Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)

Published in Scientific Reports, November 2022

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[drnikolatesla]

Nikola Tesla and X-rays

Nikola Tesla spent much time in intensive research on X-rays, publishing his results in ten articles in the period 11th March 1896 to 11th August 1897, and on the 6th of April 1897, he also gave a lecture on his X-ray studies presenting designs of a number of devices for generating powerful rays. During this lecture he reported interesting data from his earlier experiments with Crooke's tubes in 1894. During that time he had observed that some tubes which produced only feeble visible light had more effect on photographic plates than tubes which were brighter to the eye. At this time he was trying to produce "cold light," and was still unaware of the importance of these experiments so he called these images "shadowgraphs". In March of 1895, after he finaly got back around to these studies a fire broke out in his laboratory, destroying practically everything. It took several months before he could resume his work, and in the meantime Wilhelm Röntgen made his X-ray discovery in the same year (December, 1895). When Tesla heard about it, it was immediately plain what had been happening in his laboratory. He repeated Röntgen's experiments, and came to much better results than Röntgen. He would later give all credit to Röntgen for the discovery, and throughout the next few years produced some of the best X-ray imaging that even Röntgen praised.

During 1896 and 1897, Tesla carried out many experiments with X-rays, also speculating about their nature. He thought "that the effects on the sensitive plate are due to projected particles, or else to vibration far beyond any frequency which we are able to obtain by means of condenser discharges." He immediately realized the importance of high voltages for producing powerful rays and suggested using his single-terminal tubes connected to the secondary of the disruptive discharge coil. In a lecture to the Physical Medical Society of Würzburg, Röntgen pointed out the great advantage of using Tesla's high-frequency oscillator in generating X-rays.

Tesla measured the reflection and transmission of X-rays for several metals, lead glass, mica ebonite, and other elements. He measured both true reflected radiation, and the secondary radiation. He also tried to detect refraction but did not succeed, for reasons which are today obvious. In papers and in a lecture before the New York Academy of Science he described a number of tubes for producing powerful X-rays, most of them resembling Lenard tubes (which he often mentions) but without the anode terminal.

Tesla would also become one of the first scientists to point out the harms of these rays and developed safer ways to utilize them for medical use. Methods we still use today. On the other hand, others like Edison thought these newly discovered rays could cure the blind. After many patients who were experimented upon starting showing terrible illnesses Edison was quoted in an interview saying, “Don’t talk to me about X-rays...I am afraid of them.”

[mindblowingscience]

The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) spacecraft Einstein Probe lifted off on a Chang Zheng (Long March) 2C rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in China at 15:03 CST / 07:03 GMT / 08:03 CET on 9 January 2024. With the successful launch, Einstein Probe began its mission to survey the sky and hunt for bursts of X-ray light from mysterious objects such as neutron stars and black holes. Einstein Probe is a collaboration led by CAS with the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE), Germany.

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