Figure 10 illustrates how the component of the electric field parallel to the long molecules is absorbed. An electromagnetic wave is composed of oscillating electric and magnetic fields. The electric field is strong compared with the magnetic field and is more effective in exerting force on charges in the molecules. The most affected charged particles are the electrons in the molecules, since electron masses are small. If the electron is forced to oscillate, it can absorb energy from the EM wave. This reduces the fields in the wave and, hence, reduces its intensity. In long molecules, electrons can more easily oscillate parallel to the molecule than in the perpendicular direction. The electrons are bound to the molecule and are more restricted in their movement perpendicular to the molecule. Thus, the electrons can absorb EM waves that have a component of their electric field parallel to the molecule. The electrons are much less responsive to electric fields perpendicular to the molecule and will allow those fields to pass. Thus the axis of the polarizing filter is perpendicular to the length of the molecule.

Magnification formulabiology

Light is one type of electromagnetic (EM) wave. As noted earlier, EM waves are transverse waves consisting of varying electric and magnetic fields that oscillate perpendicular to the direction of propagation (see Figure 2). There are specific directions for the oscillations of the electric and magnetic fields. Polarization is the attribute that a wave’s oscillations have a definite direction relative to the direction of propagation of the wave. (This is not the same type of polarization as that discussed for the separation of charges.) Waves having such a direction are said to be polarized. For an EM wave, we define the direction of polarization to be the direction parallel to the electric field. Thus we can think of the electric field arrows as showing the direction of polarization, as in Figure 2.

Figure 6 shows the effect of two polarizing filters on originally unpolarized light. The first filter polarizes the light along its axis. When the axes of the first and second filters are aligned (parallel), then all of the polarized light passed by the first filter is also passed by the second. If the second polarizing filter is rotated, only the component of the light parallel to the second filter’s axis is passed. When the axes are perpendicular, no light is passed by the second.

Glass and plastic become optically active when stressed; the greater the stress, the greater the effect. Optical stress analysis on complicated shapes can be performed by making plastic models of them and observing them through crossed filters, as seen in Figure 14. It is apparent that the effect depends on wavelength as well as stress. The wavelength dependence is sometimes also used for artistic purposes.

Figure 15. Birefringent materials, such as the common mineral calcite, split unpolarized beams of light into two. The ordinary ray behaves as expected, but the extraordinary ray does not obey Snell’s law.

Lens is a part of a transparent thick glass bounded by two spherical surfaces. Spherical Lenses are optical instruments that cause light rays to converge or diverge depending on the type. Spherical lenses are divided into two types namely Concave Lens and Convex Lens.

Lens Formula is an equation that gives the relationship between the focal length, image distance, and object distance. Lens Formula is given as

Spherical Lens is a piece of transparent optical material with two spherical surfaces to refract light rays. They either converge or diverge light rays to form an image. Spherical Lenses can be classified into major types namely

Lens formula can be used in all situations related to spherical mirrors with appropriate sign conventions. The images which are formed by the Concave and the Convex lens can be real or virtual as well as they may have different sizes.

Light reflected at these angles could be completely blocked by a good polarizing filter held with its axis vertical. Brewster’s angle for water and air are similar to those for glass and air, so that sunglasses are equally effective for light reflected from either water or glass under similar circumstances. Light not reflected is refracted into these media. So at an incident angle equal to Brewster’s angle, the refracted light will be slightly polarized vertically. It will not be completely polarized vertically, because only a small fraction of the incident light is reflected, and so a significant amount of horizontally polarized light is refracted.

A positive (+) sign of magnification indicates that the image is virtual and erect, whereas a negative (-) sign indicates that the image is real and inverted.

The Sun and many other light sources produce waves that are randomly polarized (see Figure 4). Such light is said to be unpolarized because it is composed of many waves with all possible directions of polarization. Polaroid materials, invented by the founder of Polaroid Corporation, Edwin Land, act as a polarizing slit for light, allowing only polarization in one direction to pass through. Polarizing filters are composed of long molecules aligned in one direction. Thinking of the molecules as many slits, analogous to those for the oscillating ropes, we can understand why only light with a specific polarization can get through. The axis of a polarizing filter is the direction along which the filter passes the electric field of an EM wave (see Figure 5).

Ans. Both real and virtual images are formed by convex lenses, therefore the convex lens can produce either positive or negative. Real images always have negative Magnification whereas virtual images always have positive Magnification.

If you hold your Polaroid sunglasses in front of you and rotate them while looking at blue sky, you will see the sky get bright and dim. This is a clear indication that light scattered by air is partially polarized. Figure 11 helps illustrate how this happens. Since light is a transverse EM wave, it vibrates the electrons of air molecules perpendicular to the direction it is traveling. The electrons then radiate like small antennae. Since they are oscillating perpendicular to the direction of the light ray, they produce EM radiation that is polarized perpendicular to the direction of the ray. When viewing the light along a line perpendicular to the original ray, as in Figure 11, there can be no polarization in the scattered light parallel to the original ray, because that would require the original ray to be a longitudinal wave. Along other directions, a component of the other polarization can be projected along the line of sight, and the scattered light will only be partially polarized. Furthermore, multiple scattering can bring light to your eyes from other directions and can contain different polarizations.

Figure 13. Optical activity is the ability of some substances to rotate the plane of polarization of light passing through them. The rotation is detected with a polarizing filter or analyzer.

Magnificationof convexlensis positive or negative

Example: What will be the height of the image if the object distance is 20 cm, the image distance is 60 cm, and the height of the object is 5 cm?

There is a range of optical effects used in sunglasses. Besides being Polaroid, other sunglasses have colored pigments embedded in them, while others use non-reflective or even reflective coatings. A recent development is photochromic lenses, which darken in the sunlight and become clear indoors. Photochromic lenses are embedded with organic microcrystalline molecules that change their properties when exposed to UV in sunlight, but become clear in artificial lighting with no UV.

Magnification formula forconvexlens

Brewster’s angle: [latex]{\theta }_{\text{b}}={\tan}^{-1}\left(\frac{{n}_{2}}{{n}_{1}}\right)\\[/latex], where n2 is the index of refraction of the medium from which the light is reflected and n1 is the index of refraction of the medium in which the reflected light travels

Key Terms: Lens Formula, Spherical Lenses, Concave Lens, Convex Lens, Focal Length, Magnification, Power of a Lens, Light Rays

Magnification formula forconcave mirror

Magnification formula formirror

Figure 10. Artist’s conception of an electron in a long molecule oscillating parallel to the molecule. The oscillation of the electron absorbs energy and reduces the intensity of the component of the EM wave that is parallel to the molecule.

Ans. Object Distance is the distance of the object which is measured from the optical center of the lens. The distance of an object from the optical center is called object distance. The object distance is denoted by u.

17. (a) 2.07 × 10−2 °C/s; (b) Yes, the polarizing filters get hot because they absorb some of the lost energy from the sunlight.

By now you can probably guess that Polaroid sunglasses cut the glare in reflected light because that light is polarized. You can check this for yourself by holding Polaroid sunglasses in front of you and rotating them while looking at light reflected from water or glass. As you rotate the sunglasses, you will notice the light gets bright and dim, but not completely black. This implies the reflected light is partially polarized and cannot be completely blocked by a polarizing filter.

Ques. What is the image distance if the distance of an object of height 6 cm from a concave lens is 20 cm? The focal length is given as 10 cm. (3 Marks)

Photographs of the sky can be darkened by polarizing filters, a trick used by many photographers to make clouds brighter by contrast. Scattering from other particles, such as smoke or dust, can also polarize light. Detecting polarization in scattered EM waves can be a useful analytical tool in determining the scattering source.

To examine this further, consider the transverse waves in the ropes shown in Figure 3. The oscillations in one rope are in a vertical plane and are said to be vertically polarized. Those in the other rope are in a horizontal plane and are horizontally polarized. If a vertical slit is placed on the first rope, the waves pass through. However, a vertical slit blocks the horizontally polarized waves. For EM waves, the direction of the electric field is analogous to the disturbances on the ropes.

All we need to solve these problems are the indices of refraction. Air has n1 = 1.00, water has n2 = 1.333, and crown glass has n′2=1.520. The equation [latex]\tan\theta_{\text{b}}=\frac{n_2}{n_1}\\[/latex] can be directly applied to find θb in each case.

polarization: the attribute that wave oscillations have a definite direction relative to the direction of propagation of the wave

Ans. The lens formula is applicable in all situations related to spherical lenses with appropriate sign conventions. Thus, the lens formula is used to find the distance of an image whether it is a real or virtual image.

Only the component of the EM wave parallel to the axis of a filter is passed. Let us call the angle between the direction of polarization and the axis of a filter θ. If the electric field has an amplitude E, then the transmitted part of the wave has an amplitude E cos θ (see Figure 7). Since the intensity of a wave is proportional to its amplitude squared, the intensity I of the transmitted wave is related to the incident wave by I = I0 cos2 θ, where I0 is the intensity of the polarized wave before passing through the filter. (The above equation is known as Malus’s law.)

Another interesting phenomenon associated with polarized light is the ability of some crystals to split an unpolarized beam of light into two. Such crystals are said to be birefringent (see Figure 15). Each of the separated rays has a specific polarization. One behaves normally and is called the ordinary ray, whereas the other does not obey Snell’s law and is called the extraordinary ray. Birefringent crystals can be used to produce polarized beams from unpolarized light. Some birefringent materials preferentially absorb one of the polarizations. These materials are called dichroic and can produce polarization by this preferential absorption. This is fundamentally how polarizing filters and other polarizers work. The interested reader is invited to further pursue the numerous properties of materials related to polarization.

Figure 9. Long molecules are aligned perpendicular to the axis of a polarizing filter. The component of the electric field in an EM wave perpendicular to these molecules passes through the filter, while the component parallel to the molecules is absorbed.

In flat screen LCD televisions, there is a large light at the back of the TV. The light travels to the front screen through millions of tiny units called pixels (picture elements). One of these is shown in Figure 12 (a) and (b). Each unit has three cells, with red, blue, or green filters, each controlled independently. When the voltage across a liquid crystal is switched off, the liquid crystal passes the light through the particular filter. One can vary the picture contrast by varying the strength of the voltage applied to the liquid crystal.

Here, v is the distance of the image from the lens, u is the distance of the object from the lens, and f is the focal length of the lens.

A fairly large angle between the direction of polarization and the filter axis is needed to reduce the intensity to 10.0% of its original value. This seems reasonable based on experimenting with polarizing films. It is interesting that, at an angle of 45º, the intensity is reduced to 50% of its original value (as you will show in this section’s Problems & Exercises). Note that 71.6º is 18.4º from reducing the intensity to zero, and that at an angle of 18.4º the intensity is reduced to 90.0% of its original value (as you will also show in Problems & Exercises), giving evidence of symmetry.

Example: What is the distance of the image from the lens if the object is 6 cm away from a convex lens of focal length 3 cm?

Ans. Power of a Lens is defined as the measure of the degree of divergence or convergence of a beam of light caused by a lens. The convergence and divergence of a lens are determined by the focal length of a lens. Thus, the power of a lens is reciprocal to its focal length.

[latex]\tan\theta_{\text{b}}=\frac{n_2}{n_1}\\[/latex] gives [latex]\tan\theta_{\text{b}}=\frac{n_2}{n_1}=\frac{1.333}{1.00}=1.333\\[/latex].

Figure 3. The transverse oscillations in one rope are in a vertical plane, and those in the other rope are in a horizontal plane. The first is said to be vertically polarized, and the other is said to be horizontally polarized. Vertical slits pass vertically polarized waves and block horizontally polarized waves.

Ans. The focal length can be defined as the distance of the Principal Focus from the optical center of a lens. Focal length is denoted by f and is measured in meters (m).

Figure 4. The slender arrow represents a ray of unpolarized light. The bold arrows represent the direction of polarization of the individual waves composing the ray. Since the light is unpolarized, the arrows point in all directions.

Magnification of a lens is the ratio of the height of the image formed by the lens to the height of the object. Magnification is equal to the ratio of the image distance to that of the distance of the object. It is denoted by m. The formula of magnification using lens formula is:

Figure 2. An EM wave, such as light, is a transverse wave. The electric and magnetic fields are perpendicular to the direction of propagation.

Ans. Magnification is defined as the ratio of the height of the image height to the height of the object. In other words, it is the ratio of image distance to object distance. Magnification is denoted by the letter 'm'. The formula to find the magnification of a lens is given as follows:

The SI unit of Power of a Lens is Dioptre represented by the letter 'D'. A lens with a focal length of one meter has a power of one dioptre. Convex lenses have positive power, while concave lenses have negative power.

Ans. A Lens is a transparent material (glass) that has two surfaces, in which one of the surfaces or both surfaces are spherical. Lenses may be called magnifying glasses which have curved sides. Lenses are basically of two types which are Concave lenses and Convex lenses.

Figure 5. A polarizing filter has a polarization axis that acts as a slit passing through electric fields parallel to its direction. The direction of polarization of an EM wave is defined to be the direction of its electric field.

Figure 1. These two photographs of a river show the effect of a polarizing filter in reducing glare in light reflected from the surface of water. Part (b) of this Figure was taken with a polarizing filter and part (a) was not. As a result, the reflection of clouds and sky observed in part (a) is not observed in part (b). Polarizing sunglasses are particularly useful on snow and water. (credit: Amithshs, Wikimedia Commons)

Figure 7. A polarizing filter transmits only the component of the wave parallel to its axis, , reducing the intensity of any light not polarized parallel to its axis.

Magnification formula for lensin terms of focal length

Figure 11. Polarization by scattering. Unpolarized light scattering from air molecules shakes their electrons perpendicular to the direction of the original ray. The scattered light therefore has a polarization perpendicular to the original direction and none parallel to the original direction.

Find Polaroid sunglasses and rotate one while holding the other still and look at different surfaces and objects. Explain your observations. What is the difference in angle from when you see a maximum intensity to when you see a minimum intensity? Find a reflective glass surface and do the same. At what angle does the glass need to be oriented to give minimum glare?

Magnificationof mirror

Figure 8 illustrates what happens when unpolarized light is reflected from a surface. Vertically polarized light is preferentially refracted at the surface, so that the reflected light is left more horizontally polarized. The reasons for this phenomenon are beyond the scope of this text, but a convenient mnemonic for remembering this is to imagine the polarization direction to be like an arrow. Vertical polarization would be like an arrow perpendicular to the surface and would be more likely to stick and not be reflected. Horizontal polarization is like an arrow bouncing on its side and would be more likely to be reflected. Sunglasses with vertical axes would then block more reflected light than unpolarized light from other sources.

Power of a Lens is the degree of convergence or divergence of the light rays falling on a lens. The degree of convergence or divergence of the light rays depends upon the focal length of the lens. The power of the concave lens is negative, whereas the power of the convex lens can be positive. Therefore, the power of a lens is the reciprocal of the focal length of the lens used.

Figure 12. (a) Polarized light is rotated 90º by a liquid crystal and then passed by a polarizing filter that has its axis perpendicular to the original polarization direction. (b) When a voltage is applied to the liquid crystal, the polarized light is not rotated and is blocked by the filter, making the region dark in comparison with its surroundings. (c) LCDs can be made color specific, small, and fast enough to use in laptop computers and TVs. (credit: Jon Sullivan)

Lens Formula states the relationship between the distance of an object, the distance of an image, and the focal length of the lens in Optics. Lens formula is applicable to both concave and convex lenses. It is used to find image distance for both real images or virtual images.

Polaroid sunglasses are familiar to most of us. They have a special ability to cut the glare of light reflected from water or glass (see Figure 1). Polaroids have this ability because of a wave characteristic of light called polarization. What is polarization? How is it produced? What are some of its uses? The answers to these questions are related to the wave character of light.

While you are undoubtedly aware of liquid crystal displays (LCDs) found in watches, calculators, computer screens, cellphones, flat screen televisions, and other myriad places, you may not be aware that they are based on polarization. Liquid crystals are so named because their molecules can be aligned even though they are in a liquid. Liquid crystals have the property that they can rotate the polarization of light passing through them by 90º. Furthermore, this property can be turned off by the application of a voltage, as illustrated in Figure 12. It is possible to manipulate this characteristic quickly and in small well-defined regions to create the contrast patterns we see in so many LCD devices.

Ques. What will be the image distance if the distance of the object placed in front of a convex lens having a focal length of 10 cm is 15 cm? (3 Marks)

Polarizing filters have a polarization axis that acts as a slit. This slit passes electromagnetic waves (often visible light) that have an electric field parallel to the axis. This is accomplished with long molecules aligned perpendicular to the axis as shown in Figure 9.

When the intensity is reduced by 90.0%, it is 10.0% or 0.100 times its original value. That is, I = 0.100I0. Using this information, the equation I = I0 cos2 θ can be used to solve for the needed angle.

Magnificationof convexlens

Figure 14. Optical stress analysis of a plastic lens placed between crossed polarizers. (credit: Infopro, Wikimedia Commons)

Since the part of the light that is not reflected is refracted, the amount of polarization depends on the indices of refraction of the media involved. It can be shown that reflected light is completely polarized at a angle of reflection θb, given by [latex]\tan\theta_{\text{b}}=\frac{n_2}{n_1}\\[/latex], where n1 is the medium in which the incident and reflected light travel and n2 is the index of refraction of the medium that forms the interface that reflects the light. This equation is known as Brewster’s law, and θb is known as Brewster’s angle, named after the 19th-century Scottish physicist who discovered them.

Many crystals and solutions rotate the plane of polarization of light passing through them. Such substances are said to be optically active. Examples include sugar water, insulin, and collagen (see Figure 13). In addition to depending on the type of substance, the amount and direction of rotation depends on a number of factors. Among these is the concentration of the substance, the distance the light travels through it, and the wavelength of light. Optical activity is due to the asymmetric shape of molecules in the substance, such as being helical. Measurements of the rotation of polarized light passing through substances can thus be used to measure concentrations, a standard technique for sugars. It can also give information on the shapes of molecules, such as proteins, and factors that affect their shapes, such as temperature and pH.

Figure 8. Polarization by reflection. Unpolarized light has equal amounts of vertical and horizontal polarization. After interaction with a surface, the vertical components are preferentially absorbed or refracted, leaving the reflected light more horizontally polarized. This is akin to arrows striking on their sides bouncing off, whereas arrows striking on their tips go into the surface.

Figure 6. The effect of rotating two polarizing filters, where the first polarizes the light. (a) All of the polarized light is passed by the second polarizing filter, because its axis is parallel to the first. (b) As the second is rotated, only part of the light is passed. (c) When the second is perpendicular to the first, no light is passed. (d) In this photograph, a polarizing filter is placed above two others. Its axis is perpendicular to the filter on the right (dark area) and parallel to the filter on the left (lighter area). (credit: P.P. Urone)

Brewster’s law: [latex]\tan\theta_{\text{b}}=\frac{{n}_{2}}{{n}_{1}}\\[/latex], where n1 is the medium in which the incident and reflected light travel and n2 is the index of refraction of the medium that forms the interface that reflects the light

What angle is needed between the direction of polarized light and the axis of a polarizing filter to reduce its intensity by 90.0%?