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Activities to develop

Each student in the group has to answer the following questions


using academic references to support the research:

1. Explain how refraction and reflection phenomenon could be used


in transmission systems.

Reflection

Reflection is the abrupt change in the direction of propagation of a


wave that strikes the boundary between two different media. At least
some part of the incoming wave remains in the same medium. Assume
the incoming light ray makes an angle θi with the normal of a plane
tangent to the boundary. Then the reflected ray makes an angle
θr with this normal and lies in the same plane as the incident ray and
the normal.

Law of reflection: θi = θr

Refraction

Refraction is the change in direction of propagation of a wave when the


wave passes from one medium into another, and changes its
speed. Light waves are refracted when crossing the boundary from one
transparent medium into another because the speed of light is different
in different media. Assume that light waves encounter the plane
surface of a piece of glass after traveling initially through air as shown
in the figure to the right.

What happens to the waves as they pass into the glass and continue to
travel through the glass? The speed of light in glass or water is less
than the speed of light in a vacuum or air. The speed of light in a given
substance is v = c/n, where n is the index of refraction of the
substance. Typical values for the index of refraction of glass are
between 1.5 and 1.6, so the speed of light in glass is approximately
two-thirds the speed of light in air. The distance between wave fronts
will therefore be shorter in the glass than in air, since the waves travel
a smaller distance per period T.
If f is the frequency of the wave and T = 1/f is the period, i.e. the time
interval between successive crests passing a fixed point in space, then
λ1 = v1T = cT/n1 and λ2 = v2T = cT/n2, or λ1/λ2 = n2/n1.
Now consider wave fronts and their corresponding light rays
approaching the surface at an angle.

We can see that the rays will bend as the wave passes from air to
glass. The bending occurs because the wave fronts do not travel as far
in one cycle in the glass as they do in air. As the diagram shows, the
wave front halfway into the glass travels a smaller distance in glass
than it does in air, causing it to bend in the middle. Thus, the ray,
which is perpendicular to the wave front, also bends. The situation is
like a marching band marching onto a muddy field at an angle to the
edge of the field. The rows bend as the speed of the marchers is
reduced by the mud. The amount of bending depends on the angle of
incidence and on the indices of refraction of glass and air, which
determine the change in speed. From the figure we can see that
λ1/λ2 = sinθ1/sinθ2. But λ1/λ2 = n2/n1. Therefore n2/n1 = sinθ1/sinθ2, or
n1sinθ1 = n2sinθ2.

2. Explain the Snell law, the critical angle and practical applications
where it could be used.

This is Snell's law, or the law of refraction.

Like with reflection, refraction also involves the angles that the incident
ray and the refracted ray make with the normal to the surface at the
point of refraction. Unlike reflection, refraction also depends on the
media through which the light rays are travelling. This dependence is
made explicit in Snell's Law via refractive indices, numbers which are
constant for given media.
Critical angle: the critical angle is defined as the angle of incidence
that provides an angle of refraction of 90°. Make particular note that the
critical angle is an angle of incidence value. For the water-air boundary,
the critical angle is 48.6°. For the crown glass-water boundary, the
critical angle is 61.0°. The actual value of the critical angle is dependent
upon the combination of materials present on each side of the boundary.
3. Explain the physics behind lenses for optical diseases.

While there are many factors that determine an individual’s ability to


see, the most common and basic eyesight defects are those of myopia
and hyperopia, or nearsightedness and farsightedness, respectively.
These two terms describe the ability of the eye to focus an image. A
nearsighted individual can clearly see things close to them, but their
vision becomes increasingly blurred as distance to the object increases.
A farsighted individual has the opposite issue: they are able to clearly
see objects at a distance, but the object becomes blurrier the closer it
is. Myopic vision generally results from the focal length of the eye being
too short, while hyperopic vision is the result of the focal length being
too long, as seen in figures 1 and 2.
As the eye can be conceived as a set of lenses through which light
refracts and converges onto the retina, the complication of poor
eyesight becomes a simple problem of optical physics to solve. A
converging lens can be utilized to shorten the focal length in the case of
hyperopia, and a diverging lens can be used to lengthen the focal length
in myopic vision. A lens with a negative value of power will be a
diverging lens, while a positive value is reserved for converging lenses.
The degree of correction can additionally be adjusted by varying the
magnitude of power of the lens.
4. What is the importance of the index of refraction?

The refractive index or index of refraction is one of the physicochemical


properties of substances (optical medium). It is equal to velocity (𝑐) of
light of a given wavelength in empty space (vacuum) divided by its
velocity (𝑣) in a substance according to following equation:

𝑛𝐷 = 𝑐/𝑣

When light travels at an angle between two materials, it bends


according to their refractive indices. In order to reflect, light must be on
the wider side of the critical angle.

The refractive index can provide information for us about the behavior of
light. When light passes through the different substances its velocity
decreases by increasing of the refractive index of these substances. It
can be due to interaction between molecules of components in substrate
and effect of these interactions on light. Also in the most substrates, the
refractive index decreases by increasing of the temperature. The
interaction between molecules decreases as the temperature increases.

Refractive index has the large number of applications. It is mostly


applied for identify a particular substance, confirm its purity, or measure
its concentration. Generally it is used to measure the concentration of a
solute in an aqueous solution. For a solution of sugar, the refractive
index can be used to determine the sugar.
It is used to calculate the focusing power of lenses, and the dispersive
power of prisms. Also it is applied for estimation of thermophysical
properties of hydrocarbons and petroleum mixtures.

6. How is it possible to use the Brewster angle in practical


applications?

When a beam of light impinges with the Brewster angle, the component
of the polarization parallel to the plane of incidence is canceled out in
the reflected one. For this reason, the beam we see reflected has a
linear polarization just in the direction perpendicular to the plane of
incidence, regardless of th type of polarization of the incident beam. It
should be noted that, in the particular case of incising with a linearly
polarized beam in the direction parallel to the plane incidence, the
reflected one is canceled at the Brewster angle. In this case, a total
transmission of the beam between both means is produced.

Choose one of the following problems, taken from “Cutnell, J. D.,


& Johnson, K. W. (2009), John Wiley & Sons Ltd., New York &
Paz, A. (2013)” solve it and share the solution in the forum.
Perform a critical analysis on the group members’ contributions
and reply this in the forum.

1. When red light in vacuum is incident at the Brewster angle on a


certain glass slab, the angle of refraction is 35𝑜 What are (a) the
index of refraction of the glass and (b) the Brewster angle?

We calculate the angle


𝜃𝐵 = 90° − 35°
𝜃𝐵 = 55°
In this case the light falls from the vacuum to the glass, for which we use the
equation:
tan𝜃𝐵 = 𝑛2 /𝑛1
we replace
𝑛2 = 𝑡𝑎𝑛𝜃𝐵 = 55°
The refraction angle and the Brewstre angle are therefore complementary 𝜃𝐵2 =
55°
By replacing, we obtain the refractive index:
𝑛1 = 1.428

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