A

David

Darling

free-bound transition

Types of transition

Types of electron transition.


A free-bound transition is the capture of a free electron by an ion – a process known as recombination – in which a photon is emitted. The energy of the photon given off is the difference between original energy of the electron and its new energy in whatever level of whatever atom it ends up in. Since this difference can have any value, the result of many free-bound transitions is a continuous spectrum.