Unit 2: Propagation of light

Propagation of light refers to the manner in which electromagnetic wave transfers its energy
from one point to another. Light is form of electromagnetic radiation energy that enables us
to see objects around us. When light from an illumination objects falls on the eye, an image is
formed on the retina of the eye from where a message is transmitted to the brain through
optic nerves.
Processes that occur when light passes between boundaries from one medium to another:
reflection, absorption, transmission, refraction and polarization.

figure: reflection. Transmission, absorption and scattering of light

Reflection
In this phenomenon, the light which is travelling in one medium is incident on the surface of
another medium, returns to the first medium, obeying the laws of reflection.
Laws of reflection:

Figure 1: law of reflection

θi=θr

Angle of incident = angle of reflection

The amount of light reflected from an object and how it is reflected is highly dependent on
the degree of smoothness or texture of the surface. When the surface imperfections are
smaller than the wavelength of the incident light, reflection is even (equal). However, in real
world objects tend to have convoluted surfaces that exhibit diffuse reflections with the
incident light being reflected in all directions. Different types of reflections are broadly
classified as: specular reflection, diffuse reflection, spread reflection, compound reflection.
Scattered and selective reflections. Illustration of different reflections is provided in figure 2.
Specular reflection: it is type of reflection in which the reflected light is at the same angle as
that of incident angle. Follows the principal law of reflection. The surface is usually smooth
surface like a mirror.
Spread reflection: it is type of reflection in which light is reflected in more than one angle.
The reflection angle can be more or less than the incident angle. Spread reflection occurs
when the surface is glossy.
Diffuse reflection: it is type of reflection in which the reflected light appears to be scattered in
many angles. Diffuse reflection occurs on a rough or matt surface. The reflected light is in
any directions.
Compound reflection: compound reflections are combination of above three types of
reflections i.e diffuse, specular and spread. For incident light reflected light can be
combination of diffuse and specular wherein reflected light has angle equal to incident angle
and also at different angles. Similarly reflected light can be combination of specular and
spread and also diffuse and spread. Compound reflections are as illustrated in figure 2.

Figure 2: different types of reflections

Scattering and selective reflection:
When light passes through atmosphere, it is first adsorbed by air molecules, dust particles,
smoke and water droplets and then re-radiated in various directions. This phenomenon is
called scattering of light. When light passes from one medium to any other medium say air, a
glass of water then a part of the light is absorbed by particles of the medium preceded by its
subsequent radiation in a particular direction or light is scattered. The intensity of scattered
light depends on the size of the particles and the wavelength of the light. Shorter wavelength
and high frequency scatter more due to the waviness of the line and its intersection with a
particle. The wavier the line, the more are the chances of it intersecting with a particle. On the
other hand, longer wavelengths have low frequency, and they are straighter and chances of
colliding with the particle are less so the chances are less.

Selective reflection is reflection emitted by a surface that reflects waves of different lengths

with varying intensity. The colour of the objects which we see are largely due to the way
those objects interact with light and ultimately reflect or transmit it to our eyes. The colour of
an object is not actually within the object itself; rather, the colour is in the light which shines
upon it and is ultimately reflected or transmitted to our eyes.
Any visible light which strikes the object and becomes reflected or transmitted to our eyes
will contribute to the colour appearance of that object. So, the colour is not in the object
itself, but in the light which strikes the object. Figure 3 shows selective reflection.

Figure 3: selective reflection

Absorption
Atoms and molecules contain electrons. These electrons vibrate at specific frequencies called
their natural frequencies. When light wave of given frequency strikes a material with
electrons containing same frequency of vibration, the electrons will absorb the energy from
light wave and transfer it to vibrational motion. During this vibration, the electrons interact
with neighboring atom in such a manner to convert its vibrational energy into thermal energy.
Subsequently, the light wave of given frequency, will get absorbed by the object and never to
be seen again or released in form of light. So, the selective absorption of light by a particular
material occurs because the selected frequency of light wave matches the frequency at which
electrons in atoms of that material vibrate. Since different atoms and molecules have different
natural frequencies of vibration, they will selectively absorb different frequencies of light.
There are two types of absorption
a. Selective absorption is absorption of a particular wavelength of light. Selective
absorption causes objects to have color.
 b. Non- selective absorption is absorption of all wavelengths of light equal manner.
Non-selective absorption does not affect the color, but causes change in illuminance
of the material.
Instead of completely transmitting light, an object can absorb part or all of the incident light
usually by converting it into heat. Many materials absorb some wavelength while
transmitting others which causes selective absorption.
Lambert’s law of absorption
Instead of completely transmitting light, an object can absorb part or all of the incident light,
usually by converting it into heat. Many materials absorb some wavelengths while
transmitting others which is called selective absorption
This states that equal thickness of a given homogenous material absorb some fraction of light.
Transmission
Transmission of light occurs when the frequencies of light waves does not match with the
vibrational frequencies of objects. When light waves of particular frequency strike an object,
the electrons in the atoms of the object begins vibrating. But instead of vibrating in resonance
at large amplitude, the electrons vibrate for brief period of time with small amplitudes of
vibrations, then energy is re-emitted as a light wave. If the object is transparent, then the
vibrations of electrons are passed onto neighboring atoms through the bulk of the material
and re-emitted on the opposite side of the object. Such frequencies of light waves are said to
be transmitted. Transmitted light is the light which passes through a medium (such as glass)
without undergoing reflection, absorption or scattering. When this happens, light energy is
not lost and can be considered 100% transmitted.
Transmitted light can either be specular or diffused as shown in the figure 4. Total
transmitted light combines specular transmitted light and diffuse transmitted light. Also
transmitted light depends upon the medium properties through which light is transmitted such
as surface roughness, thickness, medium internal structure etc.

Figure 4: specular and diffuse transmission through a medium

A Transparent glass will transmit 100% of light, translucent material only allows some light
to come through, and opaque glass will achieve close to 0% transmittance. Transmission
refers to the amount of incident light that successfully passes through material, and it’s
usually expressed as a percentage of light that made it through the material. Transmittance
(T) refers to the amount of light energy that the glass absorbs, scatters, or reflects.
I
T=
I0
I – intensity/ power of transmitted light
I0 – intensity / power of incident light

Refraction
When light beam travels from one medium to another (of different optical density), its speed
changes. As a result, the ray of light generally bends at the surface separating the two media.
Bending of light when light travels two different mediums is called “refraction”.
When ray of light travels from optically rarer medium to optically denser medium, speed of
light reduces and light bends towards the normal. When ray of light travels from optically
denser medium to optically rarer medium, light bends away from the normal. Eg. For
optically rarer medium- air and eg. For optically denser medium- glass.
Speed of light is maximum for light travelling in vacuum, c= 3*10-8 m/s. Speed of light in
any other medium will be less than 3*10-8 m/s.
Refraction angle depends upon the material of medium on which light is incident. Each
material has refractive index (n), a unitless quantity which governs the extent to which the
refractive medium increases or decreases the speed of light.
speed of light ∈vacuum(c)
absolute refractive index=
speed of light ∈other medium ( v)

speed of light ∈incident medium (v 1)

refractive index(n)=
speed of light ∈refractive medium(v 2 )

Laws of refraction

 The incident ray refracted ray, and the normal to the interface of two media at the
point of incidence all lie on the same plane.
 The ratio of the sine of the angle of incidence to the sine of the angle of refraction is a
constant. This is also known as Snell’s law of refraction.

Snell’s law derivation: n1sinA = n2sinB

Consider three incident rays of light encountering an interface between two media. In this example,
the second medium is the slower medium and the rays are refracted towards the normal - note that
angle A is greater than angle B in the diagram.
 
 Since all rays are perpendicular to their respective wavefronts,

 
 
 
 Since all normals are perpendicular to their respective interfaces,

 
 
Therefore,  and   so we can now examine the following new
relationships:
where L is the distance along the interface between points P1 and P2 as shown in the diagram below.

 
Solving each equation for L yields:

Therefore

 
If d1 and d2 represent the distances traveled in the respective mediums during the same amount of
time, then we can replace them with the expressions

But v1 and v2 represent the speed of the waves in each medium and can be replaced with the
expressions
 

 
where n1 and n2 are the respective indices of refraction and c is the speed of light.
 
At this junction, we can now write
 

 
Canceling the common terms (c and t) yields
 

 
Notice that Snell's Law shows that the index of refraction and the sine of the angle of refraction are
inversely proportional - that is, as the refractive index gets larger [n 2 > n1] the sine of the refracted
angle gets smaller [sinθ2 < sinθ1], since the product of the two terms must remain a constant.

Problems:

Total internal reflection

The phenomenon which occurs when the light rays travel from a more optically denser
medium to a less optically denser medium.
Consider the following situation. A ray of light passes from a medium of water to that of air. Light ray will
be refracted at the junction separating the two media. Since it passes from a medium of a higher refractive
index to that having a lower refractive index, the refracted light ray bends away from the normal. At a
specific angle of incidence, the incident ray of light is refracted in such a way that it passes along the
surface of the water. This particular angle of incidence is called the critical angle. Here the angle of
refraction is 90 degrees. When the angle of incidence is greater than the critical angle, the incident ray is
reflected back to the medium. We call this phenomenon total internal reflection.

Total Internal Reflection

Conditions for total internal reflection to occur:

 The light ray moves from a more dense medium to a less dense medium.
 The angle of incidence must be greater than the critical angle.

Critical angle:
The incident Angle θ1 that produces an Angle of Refraction of 90 degree is called as Critical
Angle

Snell’s law states the relationship between angles and indices of refraction. It is given by

n1 sin θ1 = n2 sin θ2.

When the incident angle equals the critical angle (θ1 = θc), the angle of refraction is 90º (θ2 =
90º). Noting that sin 90º = 1, Snell’s law in this case becomes

n1 sin θ1 = n2.

The critical angle θc for a given combination of materials is thus

θc=sin−1(n2n1)θc=sin−1⁡(n2n1) for n1 > n2.

Total internal reflection occurs for any incident angle greater than the critical angle θc, and it
can only occur when the second medium has an index of refraction less than the first. Note
the above equation is written for a light ray that travels in medium 1 and reflects from
medium 2, as shown in the figure.
Figure 1. (a) A ray of light crosses a boundary where the speed of light increases and the index of
refraction decreases. That is, n2 < n1 . The ray bends away from the perpendicular. (b) The critical angle θc
is the one for which the angle of refraction is. (c) Total internal reflection occurs when the incident angle is
greater than the critical angle.

Polarization
Light is the interaction of electric and magnetic fields travelling through space. The electric
and magnetic vibrations of a light wave occur perpendicularly to each other. The electric field
moves in one direction and magnetic in another though always perpendicularly. So, we have
one plane occupied by an electric field, the magnetic field perpendicular to it, and the
direction of travel which is perpendicular to both. Representation of light constituting of
electric and magnetic field is as shown in figure 5. These electric and magnetic vibrations can
occur in numerous planes. A light wave that is vibrating in more than one plane is known as
unpolarized light. The light emitted by the sun, by a lamp or a tube light are all unpolarised
light sources.
Polarized waves are light waves in which the vibrations occur in a single plane. Plane
polarized light consists of waves in which the direction of vibration is the same for all waves.
The process of transforming unpolarized light into the polarized light is known as
polarization. Representation of unpolarized and polarised light is as shown in figure 6(a) and
6(b).

Figure 5: visible light electromagnetic radiation propagation

Figure 6(a) unpolarized light

 Figure 6(b) polarized light

When an unpolarized light ‘S’ is passed through polarized medium A, plane polarized light is
output. Polarization process is as shown in figure 7.

Figure 7: polarization

There are a few methods used in the polarization of light:

 Polarization by Transmission
 Polarization by Reflection
 Polarization by Scattering
 Polarization by Refraction

Following are the applications of polarization:

 Polarization is used in sunglasses to reduce the glare.

 Polaroid filters are used in plastic industries for performing stress analysis tests.
 Three-dimensional movies are produced and shown with the help of polarization.
 Polarization is used for differentiating between transverse and longitudinal waves.
 Infrared spectroscopy uses polarization.
 It is used in seismology to study earthquakes