Rainbow
The most charming example of chromatic dispersion is a
rainbow. When white sunlight is intercepted by a drop of water in the atmosphere.
Some of the light refracts into the drop, reflects from the drop's inner
surface, and then refracts out of the drop. As with the prism, the first
refraction separates the sunlight into its component colors, and the second
refraction increases the separation. And the rainbow is there in the sky.
This applet shows the physics of rainbow.
- The black circle represents a drop of water in the atmosphere. Red
light coming from the left.
- 50%| and 50%+ means the incoming ray is unpolarized. And we can mathematically
transform unpolarlized light into the superposition of two polirized waves
whose planes of vibration are perpendicular to each other. In this case,
50%| in the up-down direction, and, 50%+ perpendicular to the screen.
- You can click inside the colored block to change the color of the incoming
light.
- Part of the incoming ray is reflected back to the atmosphere. (indicated
by number 1)
- The intensity of each polarized component is shown along the ray path.
- Parts of the red light refracts into the drop, then refracts back to
the atmosphere.( number 2)
- Some reflects from the drop's inner surface, and refracts back to the
atmosphere.(number 3) --> Rainbow.
- Some reflects again, then refracts back to the atmosphere.(number 4)
- You can drag the incoming ray, move it up and down, and watch how the
relative intensity changes.
- R is the radius of the water. b is the vertical distance from incoming
ray to the center of the circle.
- You can click inside the white box, and see what will happen.
- When light refracts, it follow the law of refraction ni
sin(£ci)=nr sin( £cr)
- where n is the index of refraction.
- Number in the left-bottom corner : i is the angle of incidence,
r is the angle of refraction.
- Most of the light are refract out from ray 2.
If your eyes intercept the separated colors from raindrops, the red
you see comes from drops angled slightly higher in the sky than dose the
blue. You can see a circular arc of color, with red on top and blue on
bottom. Clicks inside the colored box to show this effect. You can drap
one of the rain drop, Try it!
- Did yo noticed that rainbow consists of partially polarized light.
Any suggestions! Please click hwang@phy03.phy.ntnu.edu.tw
My physics java applets
URLs link to this page
- http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Lakes/3015/physicsRef.html
- http://www.fis.unipr.it/~coisson/fo/foweb.html
- http://cccsrv.trevano.ch/physics.html
- http://www-hermes.desy.de/erlangen/ws9697/rain.html
- http://www.phys.latech.edu/users/sawyer/phys202_webres.html
- http://www.physik.uni-regensburg.de/exlinks/ausbildung.html
- http://www.math.ku.dk:81/140_science.htm(NEED
PASSWORD)
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