Transverse Wave Characteristics
The height of a wave from its rest position; an increase in this property means the wave has more energy.
What is amplitude?
This wave type has the longest wavelength and is used for TV and radio transmission.
What are Radio Waves?
This is the only portion of the electromagnetic spectrum that the human eye can detect.
What is Visible Light?
This radiation is commonly used in medical offices to take pictures of bones and teeth.
What are X-rays?
Because they do not require a medium, EM waves can travel through this area of space.
What is a vacuum (or empty space)?
This characteristic is the distance between two consecutive crests or troughs.
What is wavelength?
Used for both cooking food and wireless technologies like cell phones.
What are Microwaves?
The color of visible light with the shortest wavelength and the highest frequency.
What is Violet?
The type of EM wave with the shortest wavelength and the highest energy of all.
What are Gamma Rays?
This is the term for energy that travels and spreads out as it goes, a general name for EM waves.
What is Radiation?
The number of waves that pass a point per second; a high value indicates high energy.
What is frequency?
This is the wave type commonly called "heat radiation" and is used in TV remote controls.
What is Infrared?
This wave type is just above visible light on the energy scale and is responsible for causing sunburns.
What is Ultraviolet (or UV)?
The medical application of Gamma Rays and X-rays used to destroy cancerous cells.
What is Radiation Therapy (or Cancer Treatment)?
All electromagnetic waves, regardless of their position on the spectrum, travel at this specific, constant speed when in a vacuum.
What is the Speed of Light?
This property must decrease as a wave's wavelength increases, showing an inverse relationship.
What is frequency?
A broad term for technology that uses waves like radio or microwaves for communication.
What are Wireless Technologies?
One application of UV radiation used to kill germs and bacteria.
What is Sterilization?
These are the two wave types that have higher frequency and energy than ultraviolet radiation.
What are X-rays and Gamma Rays?
A disturbance or variation that transfers energy progressively from point to point.
What is a wave?
The amount of this increases as a wave's frequency increases and its wavelength decreases.
What is energy?
The three types of radiation that have longer wavelengths than visible light.
What are Radio Waves, Microwaves, and Infrared?
As you look at the colors in a rainbow from red to violet, the wave's frequency and energy are doing this.
What are increasing?
X-rays have a shorter wavelength than UV, but a longer wavelength than this wave type.
What are Gamma Rays?
All electromagnetic waves are composed of oscillating electric fields and this other type of field.
What is a magnetic field?