NAME: JOCELYN O.

MILLANO SECTION: BSE III SCIENCE

LEARNING ACTIVITY 1
MICHELSON-MORLEY EXPERIMENT

The Michelson – Morley experiment seeks to detect the motion of the Earth through the luminiferous
ether. The ether was created by 19th century physicists to explain how life could be transmitted
through the empty space between the sun and the Earth.

Michaelson had an established talent for designing instruments that could make the tiniest and most
precise measurements. His earlier measurements of the speed of light were better than any others
before him. In the first attempt of the experiment, it is considered as failed. Michelson created a new
instrument called an interferometer to test his theory on arriving light beams.
The Michelson interferometer begins by splitting a light beam into two beams. Two perpendicular
beams are sent by a partially transparent and partially reflecting mirror. Each is reflected back to the
point where they were divided.
Everyone suspected that the Earth, and thus the interferometer, was moving through the ether.
Michelson knew that the expected difference in the arrival of the two beams would be very small.
After all, the speed of light is three times ten to eight meters per second, whereas the speed of the
Earth through the ether is only three times ten to four meters per second. And there is no evidence of
the Earth's movement in relation to the ether. When Michelson saw no ether effect in his
measurements, he wasn't concerned. He thought correctly that his instrument wasn't dependable
enough.

In the second attempt of the experiment, other physicists, meanwhile, urged him to try again to detect
the ether. In 1887, Michaelson asked his friend Morley to work with him on a new and highly
sensitive interferometer. The new interferometer was ten times more sensitive than the one he had
built in 1880. Michelson had been considering ways to make the interferometer more stable and
resistant to passing carts and people. The mirrors were supported by a massive sandstone base floating
in a pool of Mercury.

As a result, when Michelson and Morley tested the new interferometer, they were ecstatic, and the
instrument met all of their expectations. They should be able to detect a tiny expected difference in
travel time of the two beams of light due to motion through the ether with the stability and sensitivity
they had hoped for.

Michelson interferometers can now be used to measure the speed of light in various mediums,
precisely measure the position of an object, break light up into a spectrum, test optical components,
and study wind and temperature patterns, particularly in the upper atmosphere.