Editing Internal conversion (section)

==Similar processes==
Nuclei with zero-spin and high excitation energies (more than about 1.022 MeV) also can't rid themselves of energy by (single) gamma emission due to the constraint imposed by conservation of momentum, but they do have enough decay energy to decay by [[pair production]].<ref>[http://www.wiley-vch.de/books/info/0-471-35633-6/toi99/www/struct/e0.pdf] E0 rules</ref> In this type of decay, an electron and positron are both emitted from the atom at the same time, and conservation of angular momentum is solved by having these two product particles spin in opposite directions.

IC should not be confused with the similar [[photoelectric effect]]. When a [[gamma ray]] emitted by the nucleus of an atom hits another atom, it may be absorbed producing a photoelectron of well-defined energy (this used to be called "external conversion"). In IC, however, the process happens within one atom, and without a real intermediate gamma ray.

Just as an atom may produce an IC electron instead of a gamma ray if energy is available from within the nucleus, so an atom may produce an [[Auger electron]] instead of an [[X-ray]] if an electron is missing from one of the low-lying electron shells. (The first process can even precipitate the second one.) Like IC electrons, Auger electrons have a discrete energy, resulting in a sharp energy peak in the spectrum.

[[Electron capture]] also involves an inner shell electron, which in this case is retained in the nucleus (changing the atomic number) and leaving the atom (not nucleus) in an excited state. The atom missing an inner electron can relax by a cascade of [[X-ray]] emissions as higher energy electrons in the atom fall to fill the vacancy left in the electron cloud by the captured electron. Such atoms also typically exhibit Auger electron emission. Electron capture, like beta decay, also typically results in excited atomic nuclei, which may then relax to a state of lowest nuclear energy by any of the methods permitted by spin constraints, including gamma decay and internal conversion decay.