# Tag Info

### On the definition of ray (optics) and wavefront of light

Geometric optics defines a light ray, roughly speaking and using modern terms, as the trajectory of a photon as a pure particle, which would be your second definition. Wave optics has to come up with ...
• 4,323
Accepted

### On the definition of ray (optics) and wavefront of light

What is the relation between these two meanings? For light these two definitions of light rays rays = lines of light radiating from a bright object rays = curves perpendicular to the wavefronts are ...
• 27.6k

### On the definition of ray (optics) and wavefront of light

Rays and wavefronts are used as visual aids to illustrate the passage of light. In geometrical optics light is assumed to travel in straight line if the medium does not change and in physical optics ...
• 79.6k
1 vote

### If we perform fourier transform to a pure sine wave, why it gives a bunch of frequencies?

It shouldn't give other frequencies. If you get this computationally, maybe this is because the computer isn't actually taking the integral from $-\infty$ to $\infty$.
• 921
1 vote

### If two mechanical waves interfere with each other, what is the frequency of the new wave?

The middle ear can react nonlinearly, so instead of beats you can hear combination tones. There is a nice demonstration on the web page article Combination tones: Demonstrating the nonlinearity of the ...
• 1,531
1 vote

### Can the wavelength of the standing wave be different from the wavelength of the sound it emits?

This might surprise you, but the wavelength of the standing wave in a string is pretty much always different from the wavelength of the sound it emits. What is equivalent between the two vibrations ...
1 vote

### Can the wavelength of the standing wave be different from the wavelength of the sound it emits?

The feature that is preserved when an acoustic wave transitions from one medium to another is frequency. The frequency of oscillation is the same in the guitar string, the guitar top (and back) and ...
• 3,931
1 vote

### Can the wavelength of the standing wave be different from the wavelength of the sound it emits?

The source of confusion is that you are comparing the frequency of one wave, to the wavelength of a different wave. That is why they are not inversely related as you expected them to be. One of the ...
• 4,271
1 vote

### Can the wavelength of the standing wave be different from the wavelength of the sound it emits?

We have to carefully analyze what a wave is and how it is different from oscillation. If there is a medium that can store energy in two different ways, like potential energy and kinetic energy, and if ...
• 35
1 vote

### How do Standing Waves satisfy the criteria in order to be considered as Waves?

Standing waves should not be considered waves, but rather excitations of an oscillator. Nothing "real" can be thought not to expand both in space and time. But when observing something "...
• 35
1 vote

### Is a spring shaped like a sine wave?

The question is referring to an over-stretched coil viewed from the side. I would say yest it resembles a wavey shape but I’m not sure of the wave,s properties.
• 11

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