PRISM

Introduction

It is a solid figure having two triangular bases and three

rectangular surfaces and is the closed surface. The angle

between each surface is the angle of the prism. In a prism, the

opposite surfaces are equal surfaces and are parallel. There are

two refracting surfaces which mean the surface where

refraction of light takes place. We are not concerned about

other faces.
How prisms work

A triangular prism, dispersing light; waves shown to

illustrate the differing wavelengths of light. (Click to view

animation)

Light changes speed as it moves from one medium to another

(for example, from air into the glass of the prism). This speed

change causes the light to be refracted and to enter the new

medium at a different angle (Huygens principle). The degree

of bending of the light's path depends on the angle that the

incident beam of light makes with the surface, and on the ratio

between the refractive indices of the two media (Snell's law).

The refractive index of many materials (such as glass) varies

with the wavelength or color of the light used, a phenomenon

known as dispersion. This causes light of different colors to

be refracted differently and to leave the prism at different

angles, creating an effect similar to a rainbow. This can be

used to separate a beam of white light into its constituent

spectrum of colors. A similar separation happens with

iridescent materials, such as a soap bubble. Prisms will

generally disperse light over a much larger frequency

bandwidth than diffraction gratings, making them useful for

broad-spectrum spectroscopy. Furthermore, prisms do not

suffer from complications arising from overlapping spectral

orders, which all gratings have.

Prisms are sometimes used for the internal reflection at the

surfaces rather than for dispersion. If light inside the prism

hits one of the surfaces at a sufficiently steep angle, total

internal reflection occurs and all of the light is reflected. This

makes a prism a useful substitute for a mirror in some

situations.

Dispersion

With the help of a narrow beam of light, a glass prism, and a

white wall it is possible to produce the band of seven colors

using white light. Keep this arrangement near the window.

Place the glass prism in such manner that the sunlight through

the window falls on one side of the prism and then on the

white wall.
You can see that the light reflected on the wall has several

colors. The prism splits the white light into seven different

colors. This splitting of white light into many colors is called

as a dispersion of light. Dispersion is nothing but splitting of

white light into its constituents colors.i.e into seven different

colors.

The seven colors are violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow,

orange, and red (VIBGYOR). The pattern of color which is

obtained is called as a spectrum. Sometimes in the rainbow,

you may not see all the seven colors. This is because of the

colors overlap each other.

Refraction Of Light Through Prism

When light travels from one medium to another, the speed of

its propagation changes, as a result, it ‘bends’ or is ‘refracted’.

Now when light passes through a prism, it is refracted towards

the base of the triangle. Refraction Of Light Through Prism is

well illustrated in the diagram given above.

 The different colours in the spectrum of light have

different wavelengths. Therefore, the speed with which

they all bend varies depending on this wavelength, where

violet bends the most, having the shortest wavelength

and red bends the least, having the longest wavelength.

 Because of this, the dispersion of white light into its

spectrum of colours takes place when refracted through a

prism.

Visible Light Spectrum

Actually, light does disperse into its spectrum of colours in a

glass slab as well. We can see this if we observe it in a

particular way. Before we proceed you should know

something about refractive indices. They aren’t constant.

They vary with the frequency of light and hence the

wavelength.

 Now, for white light to pass through a glass slab or a

glass prism, it is refracted not once, but twice. It first

travels from air to glass and then from glass to air. At the

first instance of refraction, it slows down and at the

second it speeds up right?

 So what happens in a glass slab? All the light rays slow

down and speed up at the same rate because both the

surfaces are parallel. And hence, to an observer, it would

seem as if white light has entered and left the slab. But

the case is different in a prism.

 The surfaces aren’t parallel to each other and so the light

rays emerging out of the prism finally follow the path

that is different from each other, giving a dispersed

effect.
Recombination of spectrum of colours

A spectrum of seven colours of lights can be recombined to

form back white light. This can be done by placing two glass

prisms side by side. But, place the second glass prism in an

inverted position. When white light passes through first prism

it disperses the light into seven colours and when this beam of

light enters the second prism which is placed in an inverted

position, a white light is obtained when it comes out of the

second prism.

The seven coloured lights recombine to form white light due

to second glass prism which is placed in a reversed position.

The rainbow

Rainbow is formed when it is raining at the time of sunshine.

When the white sunlight falls on the raindrops and leaves

them, then the white light is refracted and an arc of seven

colours is formed in the sky. In this situation, tiny raindrops

act as glass prism splitting the white sunlight.

Atmospheric refraction

When the refraction of light takes place due to earth’s

atmosphere it is called atmospheric refraction. So, when light

ray enter the atmosphere there is air and every air layer has
different temperature. These air layers have different optical

densities. Cooler air layer is an optically denser medium for

light rays whereas warmer air layer is optically rarer medium

for light rays.

The following are the examples of atmospheric refraction of

light.

1) Twinkling of stars

Stars twinkle at night because their light is refracted in the

atmosphere. When the light of star enters the earth’s

atmosphere it undergoes refraction due to different optical

densities of the air. Therefore, stars appear bright at one

moment and dim in another.

2) Stars appear higher than they are

The light from stars is refracted as it comes down into earth’s

atmosphere. The air higher up in the sky is rarer and near the

earth’s surface is denser. As the star light falls down the dense
air bends it more and thus stars appear higher than they

actually are.

3) Advance sunrise and delayed sunset

It is due to refraction of light that we are able to see the sun

two minutes before sunrise and two minutes after actual

sunset. At the time of sunrise the sunlight is coming from less

dense air to more dense air. In this case the sunlight is

refracted downwards and because of this sun appears to be

raised above the horizon than it actually is.

Scattering of light

Throwing light in various random directions on various types

of suspended particles is called scattering of light.

Tyndall effect

When light is scattered due to particles in its path, it is called

Tyndall effect. The way a beam of sunlight becomes visible

when it passes through dust particles in a room, when sunlight

passes through a canopy of dense forest etc., are examples of

Tyndall effect.
In 1859, Tyndall discovered that when white light is passed

through clear liquid having small suspended particles, then

the blue colour of white light has shorter wavelength and is

scattered more than the red colour that has longer

wavelength.

The colour of scattered light depends on the size of particles

 It is due to the scattered large dust particles and water

droplets in the atmosphere that when white sunlight falls

on them it is reflected in such a way that the scattered

light also appears white. Dust particles and water

droplets in the atmosphere are larger than the wavelength

range of the visible light.

 The extremely small air molecules in the atmosphere

scatter mainly blue light when white sunlight falls on

them. This is because blue colour has lower wavelength

and is much more by the air molecules.

 SNELL'S LAW

Snell's law is a formula used to describe the relationship

between the angles of incidence and refraction, when referring

to light or other waves passing through a boundary between

two different isotropic media, such as water, glass, or air.