8.03SC Physics III: Vibrations and Waves
8.03SC Physics III: Vibrations and Waves (Fall 2016, MIT OCW). Instructor: Professor Yen-Jie Lee. Vibrations and waves are everywhere. If you take any system and disturb it from a stable equilibrium, the resultant motion will be waves and vibrations. Think of a guitar string - pluck the string, and it vibrates. The sound waves generated make their way to our ears, and we hear the string's sound. Our eyes see what's happening because they receive the electromagnetic waves of the light reflected from the guitar string, so that we can recognize the beautiful sinusoidal waves on the string. In fact, without vibrations and waves, we could not recognize the universe around us at all!
The amazing thing is that we can describe many fascinating phenomena arising from very different physical systems with mathematics. This course will provide you with the concepts and mathematical tools necessary to understand and explain a broad range of vibrations and waves. You will learn that waves come from many interconnected (coupled) objects when they are vibrating together. We will discuss many of these phenomena, along with related topics, including mechanical vibrations and waves, sound waves, electromagnetic waves, optics, and gravitational waves.
(from ocw.mit.edu)
| Lecture 16 - 2D and 3D Waves, Snell's Law |
The main focus of the lecture is the mathematical description of 2D and 3D waves. Prof. Lee also shows that the wave description of light leads to reflection law and Snell’s laws in geometrical optics.
| References |
| Lecture 16 - 2D and 3D Waves, Snell's Law Topics: Geometrical Optics. 2-Dimensional Waves. 3-Dimensional Waves. Refraction Law. Snell's Law. Lecture Notes. Textbook Reading. |
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