➢ What is Optics

Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behavior and properties of light,
including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that
use or detect it.
Write a short note about the nature of light
1. Electromagnetic Wave: Light is a form of electromagnetic radiation, which
means it is composed of oscillating electric and magnetic fields that propagate
through space. These fields are perpendicular to each other and to the direction
in, which the light travels. This wave-like behavior allows light to exhibit
various phenomena, such as interference, diffraction, and polarization, which
are characteristic of all waves.
2. Particle: Light behaves like a stream of discrete particles called photons in
certain situations. Photons are packets of energy that carry electromagnetic
force. Each photon carries a specific amount of energy, and the energy of a
photon is directly proportional to the frequency of the light wave. This
particle-like behavior of light is particularly evident in phenomena like the
photoelectric effect, where light striking a material surface can eject electrons
from it.
3. Speed of Light: In a vacuum, light travels at a constant speed of approximately
299,792 kilometers per second (186,282 miles per second). This speed is
considered the maximum attainable speed in the universe and plays a crucial
role in the theory of relativity.
4. Interaction with Matter: When light encounters matter, it can be absorbed,
transmitted, or reflected. The interactions between light and matter form the
basis for our ability to see objects and colors around us.
➢ Dual Nature of Light in Quantum Mechanics
The dual nature of Light in quantum mechanics refers to the phenomenon
where light exhibits wave-like and particle-like behaviors under different
circumstances called wave-particle Duality.
The dual nature of Light in quantum mechanics refers to the phenomenon
where light exhibits both wave-like and particle-like behaviors under different
circumstances which is called wave-particle Duality

Wave-like behavior: This principle states that particles, such as electrons or

photons, can exhibit characteristics of both waves and particles. When
behaving as waves, these particles can display interference and diffraction
patterns, like how waves in water or sound waves behave.
Particle-like Behavior: In some experiments, subatomic particles behave as
discrete, localized entities with definite positions and momenta. This behavior
is characteristic of particles in classical physics. This particle-like behavior of
light is the photoelectric effect, where light striking a material surface can
eject electrons from it.

❖ What is the Electromagnetic Wave?

Electromagnetic waves are the composition of oscillating electric and
magnetic fields. Electromagnetic waves are solutions of Maxwell’s equations,
which are the fundamental equations of electrodynamics.
The electromagnetic spectrum is the range of all electromagnetic radiation in
terms of its wavelengths and frequencies.

❖ Huygens’s Principle:

All points on a given wavefront are taken as

point sources for the production of spherical
secondary waves, called wavelets,
that propagate outward through a
medium with speeds characteristic of waves
in that medium. After some time, interval has
passed, the new position of the wave.
➢ How are Electromagnetic Waves Formed?

Generally, an electric field is produced by a charged particle. A force is

exerted by this electric field on other charged particles. Positive charges
accelerate in the direction of the field and negative charges accelerate in a
direction opposite to the direction of the field.

The Magnetic field is produced by a moving charged particle. A force is

exerted by this magnetic field on other moving particles. The force on these
charges is always perpendicular to the direction of their velocity.

Electromagnetic radiation can be described by its amplitude (brightness),

wavelength, frequency, and period. By the equation E= h ν
 ❖ Reflection:
Reflection occurs when light encounters a surface and bounces back into the same
medium from which it came, following the law of reflection. This phenomenon is
responsible for our ability to see objects that do not emit light directly.

The angle of incidence (the angle between the incident light ray and the normal, a
line perpendicular to the surface) is equal to the angle of reflection (the angle
between the reflected light ray and the normal). Reflection is essential for mirrors,
polished surfaces, and most objects we encounter in everyday life.
❖ Refraction:
Refraction is the bending of light as it passes from one transparent medium to
another with a different optical density. This bending occurs because the speed of
light changes when it moves from one medium to another, causing the light rays to
change direction. The amount of bending depends on the angle of incidence and the
refractive indices of the two materials involved. When light passes through a lens,
for example, refraction is used to focus or diverge the light, enabling us to correct
vision problems and create various optical instruments

❖ Diffraction:

Diffraction is the bending or spreading out of light waves as they encounter an

obstacle or pass through an aperture (a narrow opening). It occurs when the size of
the obstacle or aperture is comparable to or smaller than the wavelength of light.
Diffraction can be observed when light waves encounter edges, corners, or small
slits, and it causes the light to spread out into a pattern of bright and dark regions.
Diffraction is a crucial phenomenon in fields such as optics, radio waves, and X-ray
crystallography, where it is used to study the structure of materials and waves

❖ Interference,
In the context of waves, is a phenomenon that occurs when two or more waves meet
or overlap in space and combine their amplitudes (peak heights) to create a new
resultant wave. This interaction leads to constructive or destructive interference,
depending on the phase relationship between the waves.

1. Constructive Interference:
Constructive interference occurs when the peaks of two or more waves align with
each other, or the troughs align with each other, resulting in the waves reinforcing
each other's amplitudes. When waves undergo constructive interference, the
resultant wave has a higher amplitude than the individual waves. This effect leads to
an increase in intensity and brightness for light waves or an increase in loudness for
sound waves.

2. Destructive Interference:
Destructive interference occurs when the peaks of one wave align with the troughs
of another wave, causing the waves to partially cancel each other out. In this case,
the amplitudes subtract from each other, leading to a resultant wave with a lower
amplitude than the individual waves. Destructive interference can result in reduced
intensity or darkness for light waves and reduced loudness for sound waves.

❖ Definition of Polarization
The light wave in which the particles vibrate in all various planes is known as
unpolarized light. Polarized light waves are light waves in which the vibrations
occur in a single plane. Polarization is the process of converting non-polarized light
into polarized light.
 ❖ Methods for Polarization of Light
There are a few different ways to polarize the light which are,
1. Polarization by Transmission
2. Polarization by Reflection
3. Polarization by Scattering
4. Polarization by Refraction
Polarization by Scattering-

When light travels through a medium, atoms of the medium vibrate and produce
electromagnetic waves. These waves are radiated outwards and thus the light is
scattered. In this entire process, absorption and remission of light waves occur
throughout the material. The scattered light is also known as partially polarized.
Transmission of these partially polarized lights causes glare.
Polarization by Reflection-

When unpolarized light is made to fall on a non-metallic surface, at a particular

angle, the surface reflects the polarized light. In this process, the angle of incidence
and the non-metallic surface plays an important role to regulate the magnitude of
polarization.
Polarization by Refraction
Refraction is when a light wave travels from one medium to another, it changes its
direction and speed. This refracted beam attains some degree of polarization. In most
cases, polarization by refraction occurs in the plane which is perpendicular to the
surface.

Polarization by Transmission-

This method involves the use of filter materials that have special chemical
compositions. They are known as Polaroid filters. These polaroid filters can block
one of the two planes of electromagnetic waves. When the unpolarized light is
transmitted through these polaroid filters, it filters out one-half of the vibrations of

the light in a single plane. This polarized light has one-half of the intensity.

❖ What is Brewster’s Law?

When an unpolarized light of a known wavelength is incident on a transparent
substance surface, it experiences maximum plan polarization at the angle of
incidence whose tangent is the refractive index of the substance for the wavelength.
μ = tan iB
Example: A beam of light strikes the surface of a plate of glass with a refractive
index of √3 at the polarizing angle. What will be the ray’s angle of refraction?
Solution:
Consider it to be the polarizing angle,
Refractive Index,
μ = tan iP = √3
iP = 60°
The angle of refraction,
r = 90° – iP
⇒ r = 90° – 60°
⇒ r = 30°
Hence, the angle of refraction is 30°.

❖ Total Internal Reflection

Total Internal Reflection (TIR) is a phenomenon that occurs when a light ray
traveling from a denser medium (like glass or water) strikes the boundary with a
less dense medium (like air) at an angle of incidence greater than the critical angle.
Instead of refracting (bending) as it normally would, the light ray is completely
reflected back into the denser medium.

Total Internal Reflection

We can use Snell’s law
of refraction to find the
critical angle. When
 Newton’s Rings
Another method for observing interference in light waves is to place a
plano-convex lens on top of a flat glass surface as shown in Figure. With
this arrangement, the air film between the glass surfaces varies in
thickness from zero at the point of contact to some nonzero value at point
P. If the radius of curvature R of the lens is much greater than the distance
r and the system is viewed from above, a pattern of light and dark rings is
observed as shown in Figure. These circular fringes, discovered by
Newton, are called Newton’s rings.

❖ Formation of Newtons Rings:

A parallel beam of monochromatic light is reflected towards the lens L.
Consider a beam of monochromatic light strikes normally on the upper surface
of the air film. The beam gets partly reflected and partly refracted. The
refracted beam in the air film is also reflected partly at the lower surface of
the film. The two reflected rays, i.e. produced at the upper and lower surface
of the film, are coherent and interfere constructively or destructively. When
the light reflected upwards is observed through microscope M which is
focused on the glass plate, a pattern of dark and bright concentric rings are
observed from the point of contact O. These concentric rings are known as
Newton's Rings.
 LASER

• Properties of Laser

• Components of Laser

• Absorption & Spontaneous emission

• Stimulated emission

• Population Inversion

• Principle of Laser

• Ruby Laser

• Semiconductor Laser

❖ What is LASER?
A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based
on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation.
The term "laser" originated as an acronym for "light amplification by stimulated
emission of radiation"
❖ Properties of laser light
Unlike other forms of light, laser light has special properties which make it
significantly more effective and dangerous than conventional light of the same
power. The laser light particles (photons) are usually:
1.Monochromatic: consisting of a single wavelength or colour
2. Coherent: photons are in phase
3.Collimated: photons are almost in parallel (aligned), with little divergence
from the point of origin
 ❖ Components of a laser
A laser consists of three basic components:

1. A lasing medium or “gain medium”:

May be a solid (crystals, glasses), liquid (dyes or organic solvents), gas (helium,
CO2 ), or semiconductor

2. An energy source or “pump”:

May be a high-voltage discharge, a chemical reaction, a diode, a flash lamp, or
another laser

3. An optical resonator or “optical cavity”:

Consists of a cavity containing the lasing medium, with two parallel mirrors on
either side. One mirror is highly reflective and the other mirror is partially
reflective, allowing some of the light to leave the cavity to produce the laser’s
output beam – this is called the output coupler.

Absorption & Spontaneous Emission

When appropriate energy is supplied to the atom, electrons can jump from
low-energy orbitals (ground state) to high-energy orbitals, leading to atomic
excitation by the process of energy absorption.
If an electron is in the excited state with the energy E2 it may spontaneously
decay to the ground state, with energy E1, releasing the difference in energy
between the two states as a photon with random phase and direction. This
process is called spontaneous emission.
Stimulated Emission
The emitted photon (by spontaneous emission) can collide with one of the mirrors
in the resonating cavity and reflect back into the lasing medium causing further
collision with some of the already excited atoms. If an excited atom is struck, it can
be stimulated to decay back to the ground state, releasing two photons identical in
direction, phase, polarization, and energy (wavelength). This process is termed
stimulated emission.
Population Inversion

If the higher energy state has a greater population than the lower energy
state, then the light in the system undergoes a net increase in intensity. And
this is called population inversion.
0th Law of Thermodynamics
The Zeroth Law of Thermodynamics states that if two systems are in
thermodynamic equilibrium with a third system, the two original systems
are in thermal equilibrium with each other. If system A is in thermal
equilibrium with system C and system B is also in thermal equilibrium with
system C, system A, and system B are in thermal equilibrium with each
other.
1st Law of Thermodynamics
The First Law of Thermodynamics states that energy can be converted from
one form to another with the interaction of heat, work, and internal energy,
but it cannot be created nor destroyed, under any circumstances.

2nd Law of Thermodynamics

The Second Law of Thermodynamics states that the state of entropy of the
entire universe, as an isolated system, will always increase over time. The
second law also states that the changes in the entropy in the universe can
never be negative.
dQ=dU+dW
dq=Heat, dU=Internal Energy,dW=Work done
3rd Law of Thermodynamics
The 3rd law of thermodynamics will essentially allow us to quantify the
absolute amplitude of entropies. It says that when we are considering a
perfect (100% pure) crystalline structure, at absolute zero (0 Kelvin), it will
have no entropy (S). Note that if the structure in question were not
crystalline, then although it would only have an extremely small disorder
(entropy) in space, we could not precisely say it had no entropy.
 ❖ Photoelectric Effect
When a metal surface is exposed to a monochromatic electromagnetic wave
of sufficiently short wavelength (or equivalently, above a threshold
frequency), the incident radiation is absorbed, and the exposed surface emits
electrons. This phenomenon is known as the photoelectric effect. Electrons
that are emitted in this process are called photoelectrons.

The experimental setup to study the photoelectric effect is shown

schematically in Figure 6.8. The target material serves as the cathode, which
becomes the emitter of photoelectrons when it is illuminated by
monochromatic radiation. We call this electrode the photoelectrode. When the
 target material is not exposed to radiation, no current is registered in this
circuit because the circuit is broken (note, there is a gap between the
electrodes). But when the target material is connected to the negative terminal
of a battery and exposed to radiation, a current is registered in this circuit; this
current is called the photocurrent.

The classical failure of the photoelectric effect

1. Time Delay: Classical theory predicted that there should be a time delay
between the shining of light on a material and the emission of electrons. This
delay was not observed experimentally. Instead, electrons were emitted
almost immediately when the light was turned on.
2. Continuous Energy Transfer: Classical theory suggested that as the
intensity (brightness) of the incident light increases, the kinetic energy of
emitted electrons should increase continuously. However, in experiments, it
was observed that regardless of the intensity, electrons would only be emitted
if the light had a certain minimum frequency (energy).
3. No Threshold Frequency: Classical theory implied that there should be no
threshold frequency below which no photoemission occurs. However, in
actual experiments, a threshold frequency was observed, below which no
photoelectrons were emitted, even with high-intensity light.
The quantum concept of the photoelectric effect is rooted in the framework of
quantum mechanics and provides a comprehensive explanation for the phenomenon,
addressing the shortcomings of classical physics
1. Emission of Photoelectrons: When light (composed of photons) strikes a
material's surface, it interacts with the electrons in the material. An individual
photon can transfer its entire energy to a single electron, enabling the electron
 to overcome the work function (Φ) of the material—the energy required to
remove an electron from the material's surface.
2. Threshold Frequency: Quantum mechanics explains the existence of a
threshold frequency (ν₀) below which no photoemission occurs. This
threshold frequency corresponds to the minimum energy required to
overcome the work function. If the frequency of the incident light is below ν₀,
the photons do not possess sufficient energy to liberate electrons, regardless
of their intensity.
3. Instantaneous Emission: Quantum mechanics resolves the classical
prediction of a time delay between incident light and emitted photoelectrons.
In the quantum explanation, as soon as a photon with energy greater than the
work function interacts with an electron, the electron absorbs the photon's
energy and is immediately emitted as a photoelectron.
4. Kinetic Energy of Photoelectrons: The kinetic energy of emitted
photoelectrons is given by the difference between the energy of the incident
photon and the work function: KE = hν - Φ. This relationship explains why
increasing the intensity (brightness) of light does not lead to an increase in the
kinetic energy of photoelectrons but instead increases the number of emitted
photoelectrons.