Optics Forum

Threads

High School Can Light Particles Propel Spacecraft to the Speed of Light?

  • Killer slug
  • · Replies 12 ·
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12

High School How do I create a ray diagram for refraction using a beaker and pencil?

  • Obama
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

High School What is polarization in electromagnetic waves?

  • captain
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Undergrad Refractometer design for measuring sugar concentration in water

  • catthu
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Graduate Superposition of two waves and infinitely many waves?

  • hanson
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

High School How Does Light Absorption Affect the Color of Substances?

  • jobyts
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

High School Photons as a wave traveling in a vacuum

  • Mr. Gus
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

High School If light travels by displacing matter, how does it move through a vacuum?

  • Morga
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Undergrad Speed of light and particle acceleration

  • Swatje
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Undergrad Why do fringes appear sharper with more slits in multiple slit diffraction?

  • doubledouble
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

Undergrad Glass refractive index vs wavelength, exceptions?

  • lalbatros
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

Undergrad Why is the central maximum brightest in double slit interference?

  • journeytospace
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Graduate Excitation and Polarization of Light

  • scarecrow
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Undergrad Fresnel lens with focusing light

  • CaptainZappo
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

Undergrad How does light reflect off surfaces and why at the same angle?

  • wildman
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Graduate How do gravitational waves transfer angular momentum in general relativity?

  • kmarinas86
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

High School Can You Burn Anything with a 5 mW Green Laser?

  • miloziz
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

Undergrad Is existence faster than the speed of light?

  • archen
  • · Replies 63 ·
3
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63

Undergrad Why Must the Slit Size Be Comparable to Wavelength for Diffraction?

  • C_Ovidiu
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

Graduate How do reflection and refraction work at the atomic level?

  • jobyts
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

High School Do Atomic Particles Absorb or Reflect Light?

  • jobyts
  • · Replies 7 ·
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7

Graduate Birefringence at oblique incidence with unknown refractive index

  • chimneydials
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

High School Why Isn't a Mirror the Same as a White Surface?

  • Raza
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

Graduate Does light travel forever if unobstructed, and can spacetime exist without light?

  • narcokiller
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

High School Can you reduce radio wave speed at the transmitter?

  • mixy
  • · Replies 15 ·
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15

Graduate Spectral distribution of light source -> Kelvin degrees?

  • defdac
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Undergrad Polarizer Setup: How Does Rotating Change Polarization?

  • scarecrow
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

Undergrad Here's a question on light ray optics and focal length.

  • Rainbow
  • · Replies 11 ·
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11

Undergrad Confusion in the secondary refrac. of light

  • phy-79
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

High School Mirror Sunglasses: How Do They Work?

  • daniel_i_l
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

Undergrad Can Infrared Radiation Detect Extra Glossy or Thick Pages in Scanning Machines?

  • dmehling
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

Graduate How to design for Fourier filters?

  • jaycee4u
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Graduate 2 particle system: Photon + Massive particle

  • kmarinas86
  • · Replies 6 ·
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6

Undergrad Reflection of sound from open pipe

  • abhijitlohiya
  • · Replies 12 ·
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12

Undergrad Does the inverse square law apply to lasers?

  • CINA
  • · Replies 13 ·
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13

High School Rocket acceleration after lauch and during flight

  • MIA6
  • · Replies 6 ·
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6

High School Why do objects appear blurry in fog?

  • bassplayer142
  • · Replies 12 ·
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12

High School What Happens to Electrons and Cloud Charges After Lightning Strikes?

  • jobyts
  • · Replies 7 ·
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7

Undergrad Plano-Convex Lenses: Collimating Light w/ 2m Diam. at 30m Dist.

  • gapesteguia
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

High School Spectrum flip dependent on background

  • ktoz
  • · Replies 7 ·
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7

Does my lightning rod sound worrying to you?

  • ConsiderThis
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

Graduate Can Destructive Wave Interference Defy the Law of Energy Conservation?

  • victor_st
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

High School Is light faster in vacuum than it does in water?

  • heaven eye
  • · Replies 34 ·
2
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34

Undergrad Why does light have no net charge if it's made of electromagnetic fields?

  • chrisych
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

High School Why is the angle of incidence always equal to the angle of reflection?

  • SciencePF
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Undergrad Why does light slow down in a gas if there are no phonons?

  • jostpuur
  • · Replies 20 ·
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20

Undergrad What is the relationship between the magnitude of a sound wave and distance?

  • dimensionless
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

Undergrad Why does light spread beyond the initial cone from a flashlight?

  • yonilite
  • · Replies 20 ·
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20

Graduate Can underground pipes affect holographic interferometry results?

  • FissionMan1
  • · Replies 31 ·
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31

Graduate Quarter wave plate made of anisotropic crystal

  • Chen
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

High School How do I measure the irradiance of a particular wavelength?

  • dilan
  • · Replies 8 ·
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8

Graduate Light transmission, reflexion, refraction and diffraction at a atomic level

  • SciencePF
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Undergrad Lens Flare/Halo: Photographing in Vacuum - Effects

  • technobot
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Undergrad Why High Energy Needed for 3-Level Laser Inversion?

  • TheDestroyer
  • · Replies 14 ·
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14

Graduate Blue-shift due to oblique angle of the incidence

  • Weimin
  • · Replies 6 ·
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6

Graduate What Causes Light to Bend in Gradients?

  • timman_24
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Graduate Huygens' theory, point on a wavefront, secondary wavelets

  • Rainbow
  • · Replies 16 ·
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16

High School Understanding Diffraction of Light and the Silver Lining of Clouds

  • FreeZin
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

High School What is the order of magnitude?

  • beauty-eyes
  • · Replies 10 ·
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10

High School Why does reflected lamp light appear red on my HDTV screen?

  • spizma
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Undergrad Doppler Effect, Light, and Fan Blades

  • catfacem3n
  • · Replies 7 ·
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7

Undergrad Polarization Confusion: Plane of Vibration vs Plane of Polarization

  • neelakash
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

High School I don't understand Snell's law, can someone explain it?

  • music_lover12
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

High School Do lenses bend light in a special way?

  • music_lover12
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

High School What causes the sound when lightning strikes?

  • i.mehrzad
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

High School Finding minimum and maximum sunlight data for a solar project

  • philipc
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

High School Gyroscopes feel lighter when spinning

  • MALON
  • · Replies 6 ·
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6

Undergrad Which direction is skylight polarized at sunset?

  • ChickenChakuro
  • · Replies 6 ·
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6

Graduate What is the angular momentum of linearly polarized light?

  • BeauGeste
  • · Replies 22 ·
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22

Graduate Is there a formula to predict spectral lines for any element?

  • prasannapakkiam
  • · Replies 9 ·
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9

Undergrad How does a Reflection diffraction grating work?

  • p3t3r1
  • · Replies 10 ·
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10

Undergrad See the Future: Optical Concept in Paycheck Movie

  • say_physics04
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Undergrad Focusing light using a pyramidal mirror setup

  • CaptainZappo
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

Undergrad What is the equation for calculating the speed of light in different mediums?

  • hover
  • · Replies 8 ·
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8

Undergrad Does the dipole send out light at a certain spinning speed?

  • Ratzinger
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

Undergrad What spectrum do I see from a combined red and green beam?

  • MaWM
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

Undergrad Index of refraction question-.

  • AlanxD
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

High School How does the EYE/LIGHT/LENSES WORK FOR REAL?

  • q3snt
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

High School Shadow Interference: What is it?

  • algaidaman
  • · Replies 7 ·
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7

High School Heavier Weight Lifted By Lighter

  • sedulous81
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

Undergrad Textbook recommendations for monochromators

  • Valce
  • · Replies 6 ·
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6

Graduate How do a photon's two fields look like

  • birulami
  • · Replies 10 ·
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10

Undergrad Difference between diffraction and interference in double slits

  • IMGOOD
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

Undergrad Can a virtual object form a real image?

  • cuddlesome
  • · Replies 11 ·
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11

Graduate Why do X-rays preferentially ionize inner electrons?

  • jdstokes
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1

Undergrad Doppler Law in Light: Seeing the Light Barrier

  • bassplayer142
  • · Replies 7 ·
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7

Undergrad What would two infinite parallel mirrors reflect with nothing between them?

  • HardDay'sNight
  • · Replies 2 ·
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2

High School How do other types of optical spectrum analyzers work?

  • Malibu
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

High School Turning lightbulbs on and off makes it blow faster False or true?

  • naab
  • · Replies 43 ·
2
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43

High School Young's double slit experiment presentation

  • Deus_Ex_Machina
  • · Replies 11 ·
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11

Undergrad Uniform Plane Waves vs. Plane Waves

  • Swapnil
  • · Replies 16 ·
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16

Undergrad Standing waves in a microwave oven

  • bdrosd
  • · Replies 13 ·
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13

Undergrad How Do Light Frequencies Combine to Create New Colors?

  • JPC
  • · Replies 12 ·
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12

High School Aerobatic flight and the physics principles

  • loz&
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

High School What are the wavelengths of the primary colors of light?

  • mcnaryxc
  • · Replies 5 ·
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5

High School Microscope help: how to look at an object from the side way?

  • leoflc
  • · Replies 8 ·
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8

Graduate Refraction, Fermat's Principle and Lawnmowers

  • Seeker2K
  • · Replies 8 ·
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8

Graduate Can Photons Have Acceleration? The Uncertainty Principle and the Speed of Light

  • pixel01
  • · Replies 3 ·
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3

High School Why Bluer sky with orange sunglasses

  • ZeroGravity
  • · Replies 4 ·
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4

Graduate Understanding Thin Film Interference and Color Formation in Soap Films

  • lockerman2007
  • · Replies 1 ·
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1