| | Gamma Ray Weapons? A Premature Speculation |
 | | Gamma rays are quanta of light of very short wavelength and very high energy—on the order of a million times more energetic than visible light photons, and at least 10 times more energetic than X-ray photons. |
 | | To put this energy to use, either in a weapon or for benign purposes, such as a gamma ray laser, a mechanism is required to release the energy quickly, on demand, and in a controllable manner—not at the useless pace of several decades. |
 | | The undisturbed isomer decays spontaneously by first de-exciting to the higher rotational band with the half-life of 31 years, then cascading rapidly to the bottom of this band, from where it de-excites to the ground state band with a half-life of four seconds. |
| www.ucsusa.org /global_security/nuclear_weapons/gamma-ray-weapons-a-premature-speculation.html (1442 words) |