Question

How are emission line spectra produced?

As stated by Kirchhoff.

How are emission line spectra produced?

At an atomic level

Answer 1

Cold Gas

Sources of continuous, emission, and absorption spectra

Kirchhoff's Laws

Thus, emission spectra are produced by thin gases in which the atoms do not experience many collisions (because of the low density). The emission lines correspond to photons of discrete energies that are emitted when excited atomic states in the gas make transitions back to lower-lying levels.

A continuum spectrum results when the gas pressures are higher, so that lines are broadened by collisions between the atoms until they are smeared into a continuum. We may view a continuum spectrum as an emission spectrum in which the lines overlap with each other and can no longer be distinguished as individual emission lines. BLACKBODY IS AN EXAMPLE OF CONTINUUM EMISSION (energy at all frequencies).

An absorption spectrum occurs when light passes through a cold, dilute gas and atoms in the gas absorb at characteristic frequencies; since the re-emitted light is unlikely to be emitted in the same direction as the absorbed photon, this gives rise to dark lines (absence of light) in the spectrum.