Sound

Introduction

 Sound energy is a form of energy because of which our ears are able to hear
something.
 It cannot be created or destroyed but it can transform one form of energy into
sound energy.
Ex – Cell phone rings - sound is produced by converting electrical energy into
sound energy.

How is a sound produced?

Sound is produced when an object vibrates, that is they move in a ‘to-and-fro’ motion.

Example-
 On striking a tuning fork or stretching a rubber band, it vibrates and produces
sound.
 The human voice is produced because of the vibration of the vocal cords.
 String instrument produce sound as their string vibrates.
 When a bird flaps its wings a sound is produced.
 A flute produces sound because the air column of flute vibrates air passes through
it.

How does sound travel?

 For propagation of sound a medium (solid, liquid or gas) is require through which
it can travel.
 It propagates in a medium as the particles of the medium vibrates from a starting
point (that means sound always have a starting and ending point).
 For example – On talking to a friend, particles in the air get displaced due to the
pressure caused by the produced sound. They then displace the adjacent particles
and so on.
 Therefore, particles of a medium do not travel from one point to another point for
propagation of sound; it propagates because of the disturbance caused by a source
of sound in the medium.
Wave – It is a disturbance produced in a medium as the particles of the medium vibrates.

 The particles produce motion in each other without moving forward or

backward which leads to the propagation of sound.
 Sound is often called a wave.

How can sound travel through air?

 When an object vibrates in the air or produce a sound, some region of high
pressure are created in front of it called the Region of Compression. These
regions of compression move forward in the medium as particle exert pressure on
their adjacent particles.
 With alternate region of compression, there are also regions of low pressure that
are in its front called Region of Rarefaction.
 As the object would move forwards and backwards consecutively producing
sound, the series of compression and rarefaction will be created which allow sound
to move through air or any other medium as well.
 It the medium is dense the pressure exerted on the particles will be more in order to
propagate the sound and vice versa.
 So, propagation of sound is all about change in the pressure of the medium.

What are mechanical waves?

A wave that is produced when the objects of the medium oscillate is called mechanical
wave.
Example – sound wave.

Note – Sound cannot travel through the vacuum because it always needs a medium to
propagate.
Types of wave

Wave

Mechanical wave Electromagnetic wave

transverse Longitudin transeverse wave

wave al wave (ligh wave, X -
(water (sound rays, infrared
ripples) wave) waves, ultravoilet
rays)

Longitudinal wave – The wave that vibrates in the direction of motion is called
longitudinal wave.

 Sound waves are longitudinal because the particles of the medium vibrate in the
direction parallel to the direction of the propagation of the sound waves.
 The particles in the medium oscillate to and fro in the case of longitudinal wave.

Transverse wave – when the particles of the medium oscillate in a direction

perpendicular to the direction of propagation of the wave then transverse wave is formed.

 The particles in a transverse wave oscillate in an up and down motion.

 Light waves are transverse in nature.
Characteristics of Sound – A sound are characterized by three factors:

o Amplitude
o Frequency
o Speed

Compression(C) Upper part of the wave curve where particles cluster together.
The density and pressure are high in this region.
Rarefaction (R) Lower part of the region where the particles separate out.
These regions always have a lower pressure.
Crest Peak of the curve
Trough Crust of the curve.
Wavelength (λ) The distance between two consecutive compression or rarefaction.
SI unit – metre (m)
Frequency (f) The number of oscillation per unit time.
SI unit – Hertz (Hz)
Time period (T) The time taken between two consecutive compression or rare faction
to cross a fixed point.
SI unit – Second (s)
The relationship
between 1
f=
frequency and T
time period
Velocity of sound Velocity of sound=frequency x wavelength

Pitch It depends on-

 The frequency of the sound
 Size and type of the object producing the sound

Amplitude Maximum or minimum disturbance caused in the medium.

It defines sound is lod or soft.

Timbre Characteristics which differentiate between different sound having

same pitch and amplitude.
Tone Sound which has a single frequency throughout.
Note Sound with more than one frequency and is pleasant to listen.
Noise It is an unpleasant sound.
 Music Sound which is pleasant and has rich quality.
Intensity – The amount of sound energy that passes through a unit area per second is
called intensity.

Loudness – It is how our ears respond to a sound.

Note – sound cannot travel at the same speed in different mediums, in a medium it is
affected by three things-

 Density on the medium – density increases sound propagation increases.

 Temperature of the medium – temperature increases sound propagates easily.
 Humidity in the air – humidity increases

Sonic boom – it is a thunderous noise caused by compressed moving sound waves. It is

generated by an object moving faster than the speed of sound (about 335 m/s at sea
level).

Note – a sonic boom is very powerful, but it cannot be heard or detected in all directions.

Laws of reflection of sound

 The incident sound wave, the reflected sound wave and the normal, all lie in the
same plane.
  The angle of incident sound wave is equal to the angle of reflected sound wave.

Echo – An echo is a sound caused by the reflection of sound waves from a surface back
to the listener.

Reverberation - It is the phenomenon of the persistence of sound after it has been

stopped due to multiple reflections from surfaces.

Advantage of multiple reflection of sound –

 Horns, trumpets, loudhailers or megaphones are designed in such a way that sound
can travel in a particular direction only without spreading out everywhere that
makes easier for the audience to listen to the speaker.

 In a stethoscope tube the reflection of sound make it possible for the doctors to
listen to a patient heartbeat.
  Concert halls are generally covered so that sound can reflect through it and reach
the wider audience.

The range of sound – on the basis of frequency of a sound, it is categorized into

ultrasound and infrasound.

Human auditory range is between 20 Hz and 20000 Hz.

Infrasound Ultrasound
Frequency lower than 20 Hz Frequency higher than 20000 Hz
Influenced by the atmosphere so used to Not influenced by any such factors.
monitor the activities of the atmosphere.
Natural disaster such as volcanic eruption, Used in micro welding.
earthquakes etc can be forecasted by
monitoring the infrasonic waves.
Used to stabilize myopia in young kids. Used to find flaws in material to measure
the thickness of the object
To find physical abnormalities in various
parts of human body.

Hearing aid – It contains a microphone which receives the sound from the outer
atmosphere and converts into electrical energy. This electrical energy passes through an
amplifier which amplifies the sound then moves to a speaker. The speaker then converts
electrical signal into sound waves and sends it to the ear and provides a clear hearing.

Application of ultrasound

 Clearing parts of object that are  In medical process called

hard to reach Echocardiography.
 To recognize tiny cracks in
metallic objects.
 Used in Ultrasonography.
 To break the kidney stones.
SONAR – sound navigation and ranging

 It is used to find the distance, direction and speed of the objects that are present
under the water using ultrasonic wave.
 Consists of two main devices – the transmitter (produce sound) and the detector
(receive sound).
 Waves travels underwater hit by an object and reflect back to the receiver. The
detector converts sound waves into electrical signals which are then interpreted.
 The distance of the object is calculated with the help of speed of sound in water
and time taken by the way to reach the detector. Process is called Echo ranging.

Uses of Sonar

 Finding the depth of water body such as sea.

 Detecting the presence of underwater object like submarines.

How do bats search their prey?

Bats generate ultrasonic waves. When these waves hit an object, they reflected back to
the bat’s ears. The bats can understand the nature of reflections of these waves and then
decide the position of the object over their prey.
Human Ear

Structure of Human ear

The ear allows us to receive audible frequencies in our surroundings. They then convert
these sounds into electrical signals which are then passes through a special nerve called
auditory nerve to our brain. The brain then interprets these signals and responds
accordingly.

 Pinna – the outer part of the ear that gather sound from the surroundings.
 Auditory canal – sound collected from the surrounding passes through the
auditory canal.
 Eardrum or Tympanic membrane –it is located at the end of the auditory canal.
The eardrum when receive a compression moves inward due to increased pressure
and when receive rarefaction it moves inward due to decrease pressure. As a result
it starts to vibrate inwards and outwards on receiving a sound.
 The middle ear – it consists of three bones (hammer. anvil and stirrup), these
bones amplify the vibration produced by the eardrum. These vibrations are then
 passed onto the inner ear by the middle ear.
 Cochlea – it is located in the inner ear. It converts the vibrations into electrical
signals which are then carried to the brain by the auditory nerve.