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Experiment 3

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nitin
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41 views

Experiment 3

Uploaded by

nitin
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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EXPERIMENT 3

Aim
To trace the path of the rays of light through a glass prism.

Theory
A prism is defined as a polyhedron with a triangular base and three rectangular lateral
surfaces. It is used as an optical object to study the behaviour of white light when it is
passed through it. The light bends at various angles like an angle of incidence, angle of
reflection, angle of refraction, and angle of deviation.

The prism formula


Following is the formula of the angle of prism:
𝐴 + 𝛿𝑚
𝑠𝑖𝑛
𝜇= 2
𝐴
𝑠𝑖𝑛 2

where,
µ is the refractive index.
A is the angle of the prism.
δm is the minimum deviation.

Angle of deviation
The angle of deviation is defined as the angle between the incident ray and the
emerging ray.

Materials Required
Following are the list of materials required for this experiment:

 A white sheet
 Soft board
 Thumb pins
 4-6 all pins
 Prism
 Pencil
 Scale
 Protractor
 Drawing board

Experimental Setup

Observation table :

s.no Angle of incidence Angle of Angle of


emergence deviation

1.

Observations
1. At surface AB, the light ray enters and bends towards the normal on refraction.
2. At surface AC, the light ray bends away from the normal as it travels from one medium
(glass) to the other (air).
3. The angle of deviation is observed. Here, the emergent ray bends at an angle from the
direction of the incident ray.

Conclusion
1. The incident ray bends towards the normal when it enters the prism and while leaving the
prism it bends away from the normal.
2. With the increase in the angle of incidence, the angle of deviation decreases. After attaining
the minimum value, it increases with an increase in the angle of incidence.

Precautions
 For drawing the boundary of the prism, a sharp pencil should be used.
 Soft board and pointed pins should be used.
 The distance between the pins should be 5cm or more.
 The pins should be fixed vertically and should be encircled when they are removed from the
board.
 The angle of incidence should be between 30° and 60°.
 The arrows drawn for incident ray, reflected ray and emergent ray should be proper.
 For viewing the col-linearity of all four pins and images, the head should be slightly tilted on
either side. While doing this it can appear as if all are moving together.

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