Reflection and Refraction
According to the law of reflection, these two angles are always equal.
What are the angles of incidence and reflection.
This is the wave phenomenon which allows lenses to bend light.
What is refraction.
Huygen's Principle states this:
That every part of a wavefront can be treated as a source of circular waves.
These are the source of electromagnetic waves, aka light.
What are vibrating electric charges.
A light source has a brightness of 250 lux from a certain distance. What is the brightness when a polarizing filter is placed in front of it?
What is 125 lux.
Refraction of waves happens when light does this:
What is the travel from one medium to another.
Converging lenses bend light waves travelling parallel to their principal axis towards the _____ ______.
What is the focal point.
Diffraction is the phenomenon of waves doing this:
What is bending around the edge of an obstacle.
What is the complementary color of magenta?
Green
What is the frequency of a light wave that has a wavelength of 100 micrometers? The speed of light is 300,000 km/s. A micrometer is a millionth of a meter.
What is 3*10^12, or 3 Trillion Hz.
Mirrors always produce _______ images.
What are virtual images.
The separation of light according to its frequency is also known as _____.
What is dispersion.
This term describes the direction that a transverse wave vibrates as it travels.
What is polarization.
Which types of waves diffract most: radio waves, visible light waves, or gamma waves?
Radio Waves
If you place a 4 cm object directly on the 2f point of a converging lens with a focal distance of 3 cm, it will produce an image that is ____, _____, and has a size of _____.
What is real, upside down, and 4 cm tall.
This number is a measure of the slowing of light in a medium.
What is the index of refraction.
An object placed closer to a converging lens than its focal distance will produce an image that is _____, ______, ______.
What are right side up, virtual, and magnified.
A single film of oil floating on water can take on these colors as a result of thin-film interference.
What are magenta, cyan and yellow.
People who are farsighted (can only see things far away) have to use glasses with this kind of lens.
Converging Lens
When NASA wants to use radio to communicate with a certain space probe, they know that it will take 32 hours for them to receive an answer back. How far away is the probe?
3.46 * 10^10 km, or 34.6 billion kilometers
Light striking the border between two mediums at greater than the critical angle will experience _____.
What is total internal reflection.
Diverging lenses always produce images that are ______, _______, and _______.
What right side up, smaller and virtual.
Glare from the surface of the ocean or a shiny road surface can be blocked by a ______ filter.
What is a vertical polarizing filter.
Diffraction patterns, beats, sonic booms and standing waves are all caused by the same phenomenon, known as wave _________.
What is wave interference (or wave superposition.)
Polarized light is easily found in nature, but polarized sound is never found. Why is this?
Sound is a longitudinal wave, and so can't have a polarization.