San Jacinto PHYS 2

Physics Lab 2

Professor Dr. Kam Chu

Summer 2021

LAB 8 INTERFERENCE AND DOUBLE-SLIT EXPERIMENT

Group 10:

Danny Nguyen

Kayra Erkek

Ereka Jayasekera
Tools used:
Calculator, Laptop, Textbook

Works cited:
https://phet.colorado.edu/sims/html/wave-interference/latest/wave-interference_en.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-M_Brj5Bugg

Prelab Questions:

1) Describe the bending nature of light?

When light enters a denser substance, this tends to cause the bending nature of light.

2) Describe Huygens’s principle?

When all points of a wave front of light in a vacuum or transparent medium may be regarded as
new sources of wavelets that expand in every direction at a rate depending on their velocities.

3) Describe Young’s double slit experiment?

The rays from the sun are passed through a single slit in a screen to produce coherent light. The
light is projected onto a screen that has double slits.

4) Describe single slit diffraction?

Alternating dark patter can be observed when a light is incident on a single slit.

5) Describe how to find the separation between two stars (stars are many light years further from
Earth) by using interference patterns observed on Earth?
Using Rayleight criterion, once the smallest possible angle between point sources is found,
distance between stars can be calculated.

6) Describe interference patterns from a soap bubble?

Bubbles glimmer because light waves reflected from the back and front surfaces of the bubbles
interfere each other.
Table 1 Analysis of light wavelength of green light

Slit separation, d= 1600*10^-9m Wavelengths, A(known)= 534.3*10^-9 nm

Separation between slits and Position of first Wavelength PD between λcal

screen D [m] bright fringe y [m] calculated λcal and λmeasured
[m]
4000.0 1365.4 546.2 2.2
3500.0 1206.0 551.3 3.2
3000.0 1058.1 564.3 5.6
2500.0 830.6 531.6 0.5
2000.0 671.4 537.1 0.5
1500.0 580.4 619.1 15.9
1000.0 404.4 647.0 21.1

Position of first fringe vs screen

distance for green light
1500.0
First fringe position (m)

y = 0.3458x
R² = 0.9984
1000.0

500.0

0.0
0.0 1000.0 2000.0 3000.0 4000.0 5000.0
Screen distance

Average wavelength λcal = 570. Percentage difference= 93.7 %

Table 2 Analysis of light wavelength of blue light
Slit separation, d= 1600*10^-9m Wavelengths, A(known)= 443.1*10^-9 nm

Separation between slits and Position of first Wavelength PD between λcal

screen D [m] bright fringe y [m] calculated λcal and λmeasured
[m]
4000.0 1172.0 468.8 5.8
3500.0 1081.0 494.2 11.5
3000.0 910.1 485.4 9.5
2500.0 762.3 487.9 10.1
2000.0 603.1 482.5 8.9
1500.0 478.0 509.9 15.1
1000.0 343.1 549.0 23.9

Position of first fringe vs screen

distance for blue light
1400.0
First fringe position (m)

1200.0 y = 0.3029x
1000.0 R² = 0.9991
800.0
600.0
400.0
200.0
0.0
0.0 1000.0 2000.0 3000.0 4000.0 5000.0
Screen Distance

Average wavelength λcal= 496.8 Percentage difference= 89.2 %

Table 3 Analysis of light wavelength of red light

Slit separation, d= 1600*10^-9m Wavelengths, A(known)= 682.1*10^-9 nm

Separation between slits and Position of first Wavelength PD between λcal

screen D [m] bright fringe y [m] calculated λcal and λmeasured
[m]
4000.0 1866.0 746.4 9.4
3500.0 1649.8 754.2 10.6
3000.0 1319.9 703.9 3.2
2500.0 1160.5 742.7 8.9
2000.0 944.6 755.7 10.8
1500.0 739.9 789.2 15.7
1000.0 603.1 965.0 41.5

Position of first fringe vs screen distance for

red light
2000.0
First fringe position (m)

y = 0.467x
1500.0 R² = 0.9976
1000.0

500.0

0.0
0.0 1000.0 2000.0 3000.0 4000.0 5000.0
Screen distance

Average wavelength λcal = 779.6 Percentage difference= 87.5%

 Color Position of first Wavelength Wavelength PD between 𝜆𝑐𝑎𝑙
bright fringe, y calculated, 𝜆𝑐𝑎𝑙 measured, and 𝜆measured
𝜆measured
Dark Red 637.70 956.55 799.60 19.63
Orange 450.00 675.00 599.40 12.61
Yellow 430.00 645.00 571.80 12.80
Light Green 403.10 604.65 551.80 9.72
Dark Blue 334.00 501.00 489.00 2.45
Violet 265.00 397.50 392.30 1.33

• Find the calculated average wavelength λcal(avg) of the light?

The average of the wavelength λcal of the light is 629.95

• Compare λcal(avg) with actual wavelength?

Average 637.70*1500/1000 = 95.65

• Make a graph between the position of the first bright fringe on screen and the
separation between slits and the screen. Fit the data with linear fitting and find the
frequency of the light by using slope of the graph.
• Compare the wavelength of the light from the graph with the actual wavelength.

Part C:

Screen distance D=1000*10^-9m Wavelength measured 𝜆measured = 523.5*10^-9 m

Slit separation of Position of first Wavelength 1/d PD between 𝜆𝑐𝑎𝑙

the slits, d bright fringe, y calculated, 𝜆𝑐𝑎𝑙 and 𝜆measured
1000.0 561.8 561.8 0.00100 7.2
1500.0 396.0 594.0 0.00067 13.2
2000.0 313.3 626.6 0.00050 19.4
2500.0 258.0 645.0 0.00040 22.8
3000.0 244.0 723.0 0.00033 39.2

• Find the calculated average wavelength λcal(avg) of the light?

The average wavelength is 630.08

• Compare (percent difference) λcal(avg) with actual wavelength?

20.70 percent

• Make a graph between the position of the first bright fringe on screen and the slit
separation.

Position of first bright fringe, y

600
500
400
300
200
100
0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 3500

Position of first bright fringe, y

• Make a graph between the position of the first bright fringe on screen vs the inverse
of slit separation (1/d).
• Fit the data with linear fitting and find the wavelength of the light by using slope of
the graph.

1/d
0.0012
0.001
0.0008
0.0006
0.0004
0.0002
0
0 100 200 300 400 500 600