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Chap 2 Introduction - III Nature of Light

Light is electromagnetic radiation that is visible to the human eye and travels without a medium. It has properties of both waves and particles. As a wave, light has a wavelength and frequency that determines its speed. As a particle, light consists of packets of energy called photons. The electromagnetic spectrum includes visible light as well as invisible wavelengths such as ultraviolet, infrared, microwaves and radio waves. The human eye is most sensitive to green light and can see wavelengths from 380 to 780 nm. Different applications utilize various wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum.

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MUHAMMAD ALIF SOFIAN ZULKERNAIN
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12 views

Chap 2 Introduction - III Nature of Light

Light is electromagnetic radiation that is visible to the human eye and travels without a medium. It has properties of both waves and particles. As a wave, light has a wavelength and frequency that determines its speed. As a particle, light consists of packets of energy called photons. The electromagnetic spectrum includes visible light as well as invisible wavelengths such as ultraviolet, infrared, microwaves and radio waves. The human eye is most sensitive to green light and can see wavelengths from 380 to 780 nm. Different applications utilize various wavelengths of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Uploaded by

MUHAMMAD ALIF SOFIAN ZULKERNAIN
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PPTX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Nature of Light

What is light
• Light is electromagnetic radiation with wavelengths
visible to the human eye.
• Light is a form of energy that can pass from one
material to another without the need of any material
substance in the intervening space.
• The visible portion of the spectrum covers the
wavelength range from approximately 380 to 780 nm
and the eye discriminates between different
wavelengths in this range by the sensation of color.
• Blue and violet correspond to the short wavelengths
and red to the long wavelengths.
• Yellow and green being in the middle of the visible
range of wavelengths.
Light: Wave-particle duality
Light is a wave phenomenon
 It has a wavelength l, a frequency n and travels at
speed c

l
  c

 Speed of light c = 300,000 km/s, wavelengths vary over


a wide range, including fraction of a micron (10-6 m) for
visible light to mm (10-3 m) for microwave and to
meters for radio waves
Light: Wave-particle duality
Light is a particle phenomenon
 Particle of light are called photons
 Photons are little packets or particle (quanta) energy that
travel at speed of c
 The energy of photon E can be expressed as
E  h
h: Planck constant, n: frequency
Speed of Light
How much the speed of light?
 Speed of light in vacuum is 186292 miles per hour
(299792 kilometers per second)
 Approximately 3.0 x 108 m/s, symbol is c
 How its been measured?

Is the speed of light constant?


 Yes.. in vacuum
 Speed is changed in transparent media i.e, air, water, glass
Light: Electromagnetic radiation

 The light that we can see is termed of,


 Radiation because it radiates outward from its source
 Electromagnetic because it is a packet of oscillating
magnetic and electric field that moves through space at a
particular velocity

 Visible light, ultra-violet light, infra-red light, X-


rays and radio waves are all different types of
magnetic radiation
 Visible light is special to us as it visible (mostly from sun)
and our eyes are extremely sensitive to this kind of light
What is Photon?
 A particle with zero mass consisting of a quantum
(smallest unit) of electromagnetic radiation
 A photon acts as a particle when registered by the
light sensitive device in a camera (for instance)
 A photon acts like a wave when passing through the
optics in camera (for instance)
 It is natural for the photon to display either aspect of
its nature according to circumstances
 Light is formed from a large number of photon with
the intensity related to the number of them
How photons created?
 Photons are produced by atoms when a bound
electron moves from one orbital to another orbital
with less energy
 Photons can be emitted by an unstable nucleus when
it undergoes some type of nuclear decay
 Photons are created whenever charged particles are
accelerated
 Atoms continuously emit photon due to their
collisions with each other
Group of photons?
 Visible light from ordinary sources such as the sun or
a lamp, is a mixture of many photons of different
wavelength – a frequency spectrum can be seen by
passing the light through a prism

 An assembly of photons can also exist in much more


well-organized coherent states, such as in the light
emitted by a laser
Electromagnetic spectrum
 The spectrum of electromagnetic radiation can be
arranged according to the wavelength of light
 Particular range of wavelength names as shown
below
Electromagnetic
spectrum
What is spectrum?
 An image or distribution of components of any
electromagnetic radiation arranged into a progressive
series according to wavelength
 Can plot the intensity of emitted light as a function of
wavelength or frequency or energy
Spectrum of visible light
 Visible light can be separated into its color by a prism
 Bending angle of light passing through a prism depends
on the wavelength

longer
wavelength

shorter
wavelength
Visible light
 Human vision has different sensitivities at different
wavelength
 Our eyes are sensitive to yellow light but are less
sensitive to red light
 Wavelength 380 － 780 nm are visible to human
 We cannot see ultraviolet, infrared, radio waves,
gamma rays, X-rays, etc
 Each color is associated with a different wavelength
 Violet colors have wavelength around 400 nm, yellow
colors are close to 580 nm and red colors have
wavelength around 700 nm
Human eye sensitivity

Light that can be seen is not uniform which depends on the


sensitivity of the human eye. The sensitivity of the human eye
to visible light varies with wavelength as shown above. When
adapted to medium and high illumination levels the eye has a
maximum sensitivity in the yellow-green region of the spectrum
at a wavelength of 555 nm.
Ultra-violet and infra-red lights
 Ultra-violet (UV) light
 Wavelength: 10 nm to 380 nm
 Frequency : 790 THz to 30 PHz (peta – 1015)
 Energies: 3.27 eV to 124 eV
 effects of UV through sunburn, can break chemical
bond and many other effect both beneficial and
damaging to human health

 Infra-red light
 Wavelength: 750 nm to 1 mm
 Frequency : 300 GHz to 400 THz (tera – 1012)
 Energies: 1.24 meV to 1.65 eV
 Can be used to remotely determine the temperature
object or thermography, and for night vision devices,
also can be used as electric heater
Applications

UV lamps
X-rays

Infrared heater thermography

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