INTERFERENCE OF LIGHT

Thomas Young was a physicist at the beginning of the 19 century who

showed interference demonstrating that light is a wave phenomenon
and who also postulated that waves of various lengths were made of
different colors of light.

 Wave interference is the phenomenon that occurs when two

waves meet while traveling along the same medium to form a resultant wave of
If the paths differ by a whole wavelength, then the waves arrive in phase (crest to crest) at
greater, lower or the same amplitude.
the screen, interfering constructively as shown in Figure 4b. More generally,if the paths taken
 Interference usually refers to the interaction of waves which have constant phase
by the two waves differ by any half-integral number of wavelengths [(1/2) ⋋ , (3/2)⋋ , (5/2)⋋ ,
difference and same or nearly same frequency. Interference effects can be
observed with all types of waves, for example, radio waves, light waves, sound etc.],then destructive interference occurs. Similarly, if the paths taken by the two waves
waves, surface water waves or matter waves. differ by any integral number of wavelengths ( ⋋ ,2⋋ ,3⋋ ,etc.), then constructive interference
occurs.
Two Types of Wave Interference

When two waves meet while traveling along the same

medium either the amplitudes of both waves are added Example 1: Finding a Wavelength from an Interference Pattern
or the amplitudes of both waves are subtracted. Based
on this, the wave interference is of two types: Suppose you pass light from a He-Ne laser through two slits separated by 0.0100
constructive interference & destructive interference. mm and find that the third bright line on a screen is formed at an angle of 10.95° relative to
the incident beam. What is the wavelength of the light?
YOUNG'S DOUBLE-SLIT EXPERIMENT
Strategy:
When monochromatic light passing through two narrow slits illuminates a distant screen, a
The third bright line is due to third-order constructive interference. which means that m= 3.
characteristic pattern of
bright and dark fringes is We are given d= 0.0100 mm and sin θ = 10.95°. The wavelength can thus be found using the
observed. This interference equation d sine = m A for constructive interference.
pattern is caused by the
superposition of overlapping Solution: The equation is d sin θ = m⋋ . Solving for the wavelength A gives
light waves originating from
the two slits. d sin θ
λ=
m
Regions of constructive
interference, corresponding
to bright fringes, are (0.0100 nm)(sin 10.95° )
λ=
produced when the path 3
difference from the two slits
to the fringe is an integral number of wavelengths of the light. Destructive interference and −4
¿ 6.33 x 10 nm=633 nm
dark fringes are produced when the path difference is a half-integral number of wavelengths.
Example 2: Calculating Highest Order Possible
 To understand the double slit interference pattern, we consider how two waves travel
from the slits to the screen, as illustrated in Figure 4. Each sit has a different distance Interference patterns do not have an infinite number of lines, since there is a limit
from a given point on the screen. Thus, different numbers of wavelengths fit into each to how big m can be. What is the highest-order constructive interference possible with the
path. Waves start out from the slits in phase (crest to crest), but they may end up out of system described in the preceding example?
phase (crest to trough) at the screen if the paths differ in length by half a wavelength,
interfering destructively as shown in figure 4a. Strategy and Concept:
The equation dsinθ = m λ (for m = 0, 1, -1, 2, -2,..) describes constructive interference. For (a.) Pure constructive interference is obtained when identical waves are in phase.
fixed values of d and λ , the larger m is, the larger sinθ can have is 1 . However, the maximum
(b.) Pure destructive interference occurs when identical waves are exactly out of phase or shifted by half
value that sine can have is 1, for an angle of 90°. (Larger angles imply that light goes
a wavelength.
backward and does not reach the screen at all.) Let us find which m corresponds to this
maximum diffraction angle.
When light passes through narrow slits, it is diffracted into semicircular waves, as shown in
Figure 7a. Pure constructive interference occurs where the waves are crest to crest or trough
d sin θ
λ=
m

(0.0100 nm)(sin 10.95° )

λ=
633 nm
= 15.8

Discussion:

 The number of fringes depends on the wavelength and slits separation. The number of
fringes will be very large for large slit separations, with large slit separations producing
large fringes and fainter fringes further away from the center.
 Light must interact with small slits to show pronounced wave effects , as observed in
Young’s double slit experiment. to trough. Pure destructive interference occurs where they are crest to trough. The light
 COHERENT mean waves are in phase or have definite phase relationships. must fall on a screen and be scattered into our eyes for us to see the pattern. An analogous
 INCOHERENT means the waves have random phase relationships. pattern for water waves is shown in Figure 7b. Note that regions of constructive and
 Two slits provide two coherent light sources that then interfere constructively or destructive interference move out from the slits at well-defined angles to the original beam.
destructively. Young used sunlight, where each wavelength forms its own pattern, These angles depend on wavelength and the distance between the slits.
making the effect more difficult to see.
 We illustrate the double slit experiment with monochromatic ( single ⋋ ) light to clarify Figure 7. Double slits produce two coherent sources of waves that interfere. (a) Light spreads
the effects. out (diffracts) from each slit, because the slits are narrow. These waves overlap and interfere
constructively (dark regions). We can only see this if the light falls onto a screen and is
Figure 5. Young’s double slit experiment. Here scattered into our eyes. (b) Double slit interference pattern of water waves nearly identical to
pure-wavelength light sent through a pair of that for light. Wave action is greatest in regions of constructive interference and least in
vertical slits is diffracted into a pattern on the regions of destructive interference. (c) When light that has passes through double slits falls
screen of numerous vertical lines spread out on a screen, we see a pattern such as this. (credit: PASCO)
horizontally. Without diffraction and
interference, the light would simply make two KEY POINTS
lines on the screen.
 Young's double slit experiment gave definitive proof of the wave character of
Figure 6 shows the pure constructive and destructive interference of two waves having the same and light. An interference pattern is obtained by the superposition of light from two
amplitude. slits.
 There is constructive interference when d sin = mλ (for m = 0, 1, −1, 2,-2), where d
is the distance between the slits, & is the angle relative to the incident direction,
and m is the order of the interference.
 There is destructive interference when d sin = mλ (form = 0, 1, -1,2-2,
 Diffraction refers to various phenomena that occur when a wave encounters an
obstacle. In classical physics, the diffraction phenomenon is described as the
apparent bending of waves around small obstacles and the spreading out of waves
Figure 6. The amplitudes of waves add. past small openings.
TWO-SLIT DIFFRACTION PATTERN

The diffraction pattern of two slits of width a that are separated by a distance d is the
interference pattem of two-point sources separated by d multiplied by the diffraction
pattern of a slit of width a. (dima butang ang picture) Note that this approach is relatively straightforward and gives a result that is almost exactly
the same as the more complicated analysis using phasors to work out the intensity values of
the double-slit interference (thin line in Figure 8). The phasor approach accounts for the
downward slope in the diffraction intensity (blue line) so that the peak near m=1 occurs at a
value of @ ever so slightly smaller than we have shown here.

Example 4: Two-slit Diffraction

Suppose that in Young's experiment, slits of width 0.020 mm are separated by 0.20 mm. If
the slits are illuminated by monochromatic light of wavelength 500 nm, how many bright
fringes are observed in the central peak of the diffraction pattern?

Figure 8. Diffraction from a double slit. The purple line with peaks of the same height is from
the interference of the waves from two slits; the blue line with one big hump in the middle is
the diffraction of waves from within one slit; and the thick red line is the product of the two,
which is the pattem observed on the screen. The plot shows the expected result for a slit
width a=2\a=2A and slit separation d=6λd=6A. The maximum of m=13m-13 order for the
interference is missing because the minimum of the diffraction occurs in the same direction.

Example 3: Intensity of the Fringes

Figure 8 shows that the intensity of the fringe for m = 3 is zero, but what about the other
fringes? Calculate the intensity for the fringe at m=1m=1 relative to lo, the intensity of the
central peak.

Strategy: Determine the angle for the double-slit interference fringe, using the equation from
Interference, then determine the relative intensity in that direction due to diffraction.

Solution: From the chapter on interference, we know that the bright interference fringes
occur at