Interference occurs, if two waves are said to be coherent

[Gavroy]

hi,

Our teacher told us, that interference occurs, if two waves are said to be coherent.

but doesn't it have also something to do with the polarization of the two waves?

so can one observe interference, if one has:
circular or ellipctical polarized waves, when these two have a constant phase.-> I would say yes.

but now I saw in the internet, that if one has two linear polarized waves whose E-vectors have a phase angle of pi/2, then there occurs no interference, is that right?

I don't really know, if polarization has something to do with interference or not, could somebody help me?

 

[Gavroy]

does nobody have an idea?

or is something unclear about my question?

 

[RedX]

hi,

Our teacher told us, that interference occurs, if two waves are said to be coherent.

but doesn't it have also something to do with the polarization of the two waves?

so can one observe interference, if one has:
circular or ellipctical polarized waves, when these two have a constant phase.-> I would say yes.

but now I saw in the internet, that if one has two linear polarized waves whose E-vectors have a phase angle of pi/2, then there occurs no interference, is that right?

I don't really know, if polarization has something to do with interference or not, could somebody help me?

Polarization shouldn't have anything to do with interference. If you have light polarized in one direction and add to it light polarized in an orthogonal direction, then there is no interference between these two light waves, and the intensity is just the sum of the intensities.

In optics therefore it is common to think of light as a scalar when discussing interference (at least I think - any optics people here?).

 

[Andy Resnick]

hi,

Our teacher told us, that interference occurs, if two waves are said to be coherent.

but doesn't it have also something to do with the polarization of the two waves?

so can one observe interference, if one has:
circular or ellipctical polarized waves, when these two have a constant phase.-> I would say yes.

In order for two (electromagnetic) waves to interfere, the two waves must have the same polarization.

Circularly polarized and elliptically polarized light will partially interfere: the elliptical polarization can be decomposed into two orthogonal circular states (left-handed and right-handed), and whichever one is coincident with the other wave will interfere with it.