Refraction through a Rectangular Glass Slab
Refraction is the bending of light as it travels from one medium to another, driven by changes in speed. This section details an experiment involving a rectangular glass slab that demonstrates the principle of refraction. When incident light rays encounter the slab, they bend towards the normal when entering the denser glass from air, causing a change in direction. Exiting the slab, the light rays bend away from the normal, emerging parallel to their original direction.
Key Points Covered:
- Laws of Refraction: The incident ray, refracted ray, and normal at the point of incidence lie in the same plane. The ratio of the sine of the angle of incidence to the sine of the angle of refraction is constant for a given pair of media, known as Snell's Law.
- Practical Activity: An outlined experiment with a glass slab demonstrates how to visualize refraction by marking the position of pins at the beginning and end of the refraction process, demonstrating the light ray shifts position but remains parallel before and after passing through the slab.
- Significance: Understanding these concepts is essential in many applications such as lenses in glasses, cameras, and optical instruments. Refraction principles are foundational in understanding optical phenomena in science.