The electrons collide with other free electrons sending them back toward the atoms. In a neon lamp light is made by exciting gas atoms in the space between two electrodes and there s no need for a hot cathode.

How Neon Lights Work Youtube

Electricity provides energy to strip electrons away from neon atoms ionizing them.

How does a neon tube produce light. Light is produced when neon atoms gain enough energy to become excited. The ultraviolet light emitted by the mercury discharge inside a tube is absorbed by the coating which subsequently emits light of a different color and with a lower photon energy. As the electrons are absorbed i.

Ions are attracted to terminals of the lamp completing the electric circuit. A neon light contains a tiny amount of neon gas under low pressure. Indeed you ll find neon lamps surprisingly hot if you stand anywhere near them.

Electrical current bombard the inert gas atoms with electrons knocking neon s atoms out of their orbits. But just because the cathode isn t heated it doesn t follow that a neon lamp is cold.