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294
ON THE WIDENING OF SPECTRUM LINES
[39
and this is now to be integrated with respect to £ between the limits ± oc The bracket in (8) is
1 4- cos -^j— cos
A          Ac
— sin-
—— sin —T— A           Ac
The third term, being uneven in £, contributes nothing.    The remainrn integrals are included in the well-known formula
cos
\lir a
Thus
7 =
The intensity Ja at the darkest part of the bands is found by making X a odd multiple of iX, and /2 the maximum brightness by making X a mnltip

where F denotes the "visibility" according to Michelson's definition. Equi tion (10) is the result arrived at in my former paper, and /9 can be expresse in terms of either the mean velocity v, or preferably of the velocity of mea square v'*.
'The next question is what is the smallest value of Ffor which the ban( are recognizable. Relying on photometric experience, I estimated that a rel; tive difference of 5 per cent, between 7a and 72 would be about the limit i the case of high interference bands, and I took F = '025. Shortly afterwards I made special experiments upon bands well under control, obtained by meai of double refraction, and I found that in this very favourable case the bant were still just distinctly seen when the relative difference between 7i and , was reduced to 4 per cent. It would seem then that the estimate F = 'OS can hardly be improved upon. On this basis (10) gives in terms of v
~y         9/>                                                      />
(12)
as before.    In terms of v' by (6)
X =   V3.c
A       j   /o
As an example of (12), let us apply it to hydrogen molecules at 0° < Here v' = 1839 x 102 cm./sec.J, and c = 3 x 1010.   Thus
J/A = T222 xlO6............................(13)
* See also Proc. Roy. Soc. Vol. LXXVI A. p. 440 (1905); Scientific Papers, Vol. v. p. 261. t Phil. Mag. Vol. xxvii. p. 484 (1889); Scientific Papers, Vol. in. p. 277. t It seems to be often forgotten that the first published calculation of molecular velocities w that of Joule (Manchester Memoirs, Oct. 1848, Phil. Mag. ser. 4, Vol. xiv. p. 211).889, but with a few slight changes of notation.