x-ray tube

noun

1. an electronic tube for producing x-rays, essentially a cathode-ray tube in which a metal target is bombarded with high-energy electrons.

X-ray tube

noun

1. an evacuated tube containing a metal target onto which is directed a beam of electrons at high energy for the generation of X-rays

Word History and Origins

Origin of x-ray tube¹

First recorded in 1905–10

Example Sentences

Using an industrial computed tomography scanner, which is sort of like an MRI machine but with a rotating X-ray tube, the researchers blasted the Cratonavis skull with 150 kilovolts of beam energy.

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In CT machines, an X-ray tube rotates around the patient, taking multiple images of the body’s innards.

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Then the boy soon pops up on the exit side of security as he emerges out of the X-ray tube.

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There was such anxiety around the dangers the rays might pose that Mr. Thomson exposed two of his fingers to an X-ray tube to prove that they were not harmless.

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One year after X-rays were first discovered, a founder of the modern electric age, Elihu Thomson, created an X-ray tube.

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