Special Theory of Relativity (PH101)

Course Instructors: Pankaj Mishra and Tapan Mishra

1. A helicopter is flying with a constant speed of 180 km/hr along the horizontal x-direction with
respect to an observer on the ground at a height of 500 m. Consider the y-direction vertically
upwards. At certain time, the pilot releases a packet which drops down with zero initial vertical
speed. Set the coordinates of the observer and the pilot so that at the time of release, the packet
is at the origin in both the reference frames. Set this time to be t=0. Consider acceleration
due to gravity g = 9.8m/sec2 . Find the position and velocity of the packet in the two frames,
5 seconds after it is dropped, according to Galilean Relativity.

2. Compare the speeds of the following with that of light (express as fraction of c). In each of the
cases find the prefactor γ that appear in the Lorentz transformation.
(i) Hima Das running at a speed of 100m in 10 sec.
(ii) Maglev train running at a speed of 500 km/hr.
(iii)Concord aircraft flying with ground speed 1800 km/hr.
(iv) Space-shuttle moving with a speed of 27000km/hr.
(v)Earth orbiting around Sun with a speed of 30km per second.
(vi)Proton making one round of 27km circumference of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) tunnel
in 100 micro second.

X
, X, 0, 0 and t = Xc , 3X, 0, 0 in a frame S. What is the speed



3. Two events occur at t = 2c
of frame S 0 (moving along x-axis with constant speed), so that the above two events occur
at the same time in this frame? What is the value of this time, and what are the values of
x-coordinate in S 0 ?

4. The earth and Sun are 8.3 light-minutes (the distance traveled by light in one minute) apart.
Ignore their relative motion for this problem and assume they live in a single inertial frame, the
Earth-Sun frame. Events A and B occur at t = 0 on the earth and at t=2 minutes on the Sun
respectively. Find the time difference between the events according to an observer moving at
u = 0.8c from Earth to Sun. Repeat if observer is moving in the opposite direction at u = 0.8c.
5. An observer in frame S who lives on the x-axis sees a flash of red light at x = 1210m. After
4.96µs, he sees flash of blue light at x = 480m. Use subscripts R and B to label the coordinates
of the events related to the red and blue light respectively.
(i) Now suppose there is an observer in S 0 which is moving with a velocity ‘v’ with respect to
the S frame watches these events. Compute the velocity v for the situation when the observer
in S 0 records both the events occurring at the same place?
(ii) Which event occurs first according to S 0 and what is the measured time interval between
these flashes?

6. The average lifetime of a π meson in its own frame of reference is 26.0 ns. (This is its proper
lifetime.) What will be the lifetime of π meson as measured by an observer at rest on earth if
it moves with respect to the Earth with a speed 0.95c. Also compute the average distance it
will travel before decaying as measured by an observer at rest on Earth.
 2

7. The change in frequency of wave that happens due to relative motion between the source and
observer isknown as the “Doppler effect.” In Galilean relativity the modified frequency is given
v ± vo
by ν = ν0 , where, ν0 is the original emitted frequency, ν is the observed(detected)
v ∓ vs
frequency, v, vs , and vo is the velocity of wave (e.g., sound wave),observer, and source relative
to the medium respectively. Here +(−) stands for the situation when observerris approaching
v ± vo
(receding) towards (from) source. This relation gets modified in STR as ν = ν0 . Using
v ∓ vs
this information solve the following problem.

A driver is caught violating the traffic rule by going through a red light signal. The driver
claims to the judge that the color she actually saw was green (ν = 5.60 × 1014 Hz) and not red
(ν = 4.80 × 1014 Hz) because of the Doppler effect. The judge accepts this explanation and
instead fines her for speeding at the rate of 100 Rupees for each km/h that she exceeded the
speed limit of 80 km/h. Compute the total fine amount?
∂ 2E 1 ∂ 2E
8. The light wave equation is given by − = 0, where, E is the electric field and c is
∂x2 c2 ∂t2
the velocity of light. Show that under Galileantransformation the above equation will have the
∂ 2E 0 1 ∂ 2E 0 2vx ∂ 2 E 0 ∂E 0

vx ∂
form as − 2 02 − 2 − 2 0 vx 0 = 0, where vx is the speed of S 0 frame
∂x02 c ∂t c ∂x0 ∂t0 c ∂x ∂x
w.r.t. the S frame. That shows that light wave equation is not compatible with the Galilean
relativity. Hint: Use the transformation formula discussed during the first lecture of STR.