Elastic waves

and sound
 Introduction

• This CLIL project, acronym for content and language integrated learning, focused on the
elastic waves and sound, involves learning the physical discipline.

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SUMMARY
• The nature of waves.

• Periodic waves: spatial dependence.

• Periodic waves: time dependence.

• Mathematical description of waves.

• The nature of sound.

• The speed of sound.

• Sound intensity.

• Decibels.

• The Doppler effect.

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The nature of waves
A wave has two main characteristics:

1. it is a travelling disturbance;

2. it carries energy from one place to another.

We will consider two basic types of waves:

longitudinal (a) and transerve (b).

• For longitudinal waves (a): the

direction of the disturbance
(displacement) is parallel to the
direction of wave motion.

• For transverse waves (b): the

direction of the disturbance
(displacement) is perpendicular to
the direction of wave motion.

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Periodic waves: spatial dependence
Transverse and longitudinal waves are called periodic waves because they consist of regularly repeating patterns that
are produced over and over again by the source. Example: draw a transverse momentum wave and define the
amplitude and wavelength. These definitions also apply to longitudinal waves.

• In the diagram, a single cycle of the wave is

highlighted in colour. a wave is a series of these
=λ
repeating cycles.

The amplitude A is the maximum displacement of a particle from its

undisturbed position.

The wavelength λ is the spatial period of the wave in the direction of motion: the
horizontal length of one cycle of the wave or the distance between any two successive
points with the same phase.
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 Periodic waves: time dependence
A wave can be described as a function of time by observing the change
in displacement of a single point on the wave. As the wave passes, the
point under observation oscillates in simple harmonic.

The period T [s] is the time

required for one complete
cycle. It is related to the
frequency by: f = 1/T [Hz].

For any periodic wave, the relationship between period,

wavelength, and speed is given by:

v= λ =fλ
T
This relationship applies to longitudinal as well as to
transverse waves.
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Mathematical description of waves
When a wave travels through a medium, it displaces the particles of the medium from their undisturbed positions.

Suppose that a particle is located at a distance x from the origin of a coordinate system.
We would like to know the displacement (y) of this particle from its undisturbed position at any time (t) as the wave
passes.

This equation represents the displacement of a particle

(
Y= A sin 2πft - 2π x
y ) for a wave travelling in the positive x direction (to the
right), with an amplitude A, frequency f, and
wavelength λ.

This equation assumes that y = 0 m when x = 0 m and t = 0 s and applies equally to

transverse or longitudinal waves.
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The nature of sound
Sound is carried by longitudinal waves that are created by vibrating objects, such as a guitar string, the human
vocal cords, or the diaphragm of a loudspeaker.

Sound can be created or transmitted only in a

medium, such as a gas, liquid, or solid. Sound
cannot propagate in a vacuum.

Sound has an associated frequency, which is the number of cycles per second passing a given location.
acoustic microscopy
low bass medical therapy
notes NDT and medical
earthquake animal hearing
diagnostics A sound can be made up of several
overlapping waves with different
frequencies. A sound with a single
20 Hz 20 KHz 2MHz 200 MHz frequency is called a pure tone.
infrasound acoustic ultrasound acoustic
microscopy
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The speed of sound
Sound travels through gases, liquids, and solids at considerably different speeds

The speed of a wave depends on the

Substance Speed
properties of the medium it is travelling in. (m/s)

gases

air 343
(20 °C)

helium 965
(0 °C)

liquid

mercury 1,450
(20°C)

Seawater 1, 522
The speed of light is much greater than the speed of (20 °C)
sound. Therefore, lightning reaches the observer well solid
before the thunder.
copper 5,010
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Sound intensity
Sound waves carry energy that can be used to do work. The amount of energy transported per
second by a sound wave is the power of the wave and is measured in SI units of joules per second
(J/s) or watts (W).

Sound intensity I is defined as the sound

power P that passes perpendicularly through a
surface divided by the area A of that surface:

I= P

• In extreme cases, the energy carried by sounds waves

can be sufficient to cause damage.

• Sound intensity decreases with increasing
distance from the source.
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Decibels
The decibel (dB) is a measurement unit used when comparing two sound
intensities.

The intensity level (expressed in decibels) is defined as:

I0 is the threshold of hearing (I0 =
β= (10 dB)log ( II )
0
1.00 × 10–12 W/m2), the reference
intensity to which I is compared
intensity l (W/m) intensity level β
threshold of hearing 1.00 ×10-12 0

rustling leaves 1.00 ×10-11 10

a whisper 1.00 ×10-10 20

normal conversation 1.00 ×10-6 65

(1 metre)
inside a car in city traffic 1.00 ×10-4 80

a car without silencer 1.00 ×10-2 100

live rock concert 1 120

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The Doppler effect
• The Doppler effect is the change in frequency of the sound (fs) heard by an observer (fo) when the sound source and
the observer have different velocities with respect to the propagating medium. Source and observer at rest: the sound
frequency detected by any observer is the same fo = fs.

Moving source vs and observer at rest: the Source at rest and moving observer vo:
sound frequency fs detected by an the sound frequency fs detected by an
observer changes over time according to: observer changes over time according to:
v F0 = v+v0 fs
F0 =
v+vs v

compression region wave length

longer wave
shorter wave lenghth
lenghth

source at rest
source moving

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 Thanks for
the vision
Giorgia Vitti

5^ F linguistic

Martedì 2 febbraio 20XX Testo del piè di pagina di esempio 13