I was talking to my brother the other day about what kids these days well never experience and this topic came up.
I remember as a kid I liked to brush my hand on the tv screen so I could feel the fuzzy air. What was that and why was it there?
In: Physics
CRT televisions displayed an image on a screen made out of a phosphor – a material that glows when exposed to radiation. In the case of the TV, the phosphor was designed to glow in response to electron radiation, as this is easily produced and controlled precisely. By changing the strength and direction of a beam of electron radiation (using magnets) an old CRT TV would scan over every pixel on the screen dozens of times every second and draw out the image in the phosphor.
So, you have what’s more or less a constant stream of electrons barraging the inside of the glass screen, and they’ve got to go *somewhere*. They pile up in the glass, producing a negative static charge and seeping out into the surroundings.
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