INTERFERENCE

PROBLEM RESOLUTION

Fundamentals of Physics [Halliday & Resnick] NOVENA EDICION

PAG 1009

QUESTION
1 In Fig. 35-30, a light wave along
ray r1 reflects once from a mirror and
a light wave along ray r2 reflects
twice from that same mirror and
once from a tiny mirror at distance L
from the bigger mirror. (Neglect the
slight tilt of the rays.) The waves have
wavelength 620 nm and are initially in
phase. (a) What is the smallest value of L that puts the final light
waves exactly out of phase? (b) With the tiny mirror initially at that
value of L, how far must it be moved away from the bigger mirror to
again put the final waves out of phase?

1. The fact that wave W2 reflects two additional times has no substantive effect on the
calculations, since two reflections amount to a 2(/2) = phase difference, which is
effectively not a phase difference at all. The substantive difference between W2 and W1
is the extra distance 2L traveled by W2.

(a) For wave W2 to be a half-wavelength behind wave W1, we require

2L = /2, or L =/4 = (620 nm)/4 =155 nm using the wavelength value given in
the problem.

(b) Destructive interference will again appear if W2 is 32 behind the other wave. In
this case, 2L = 3 2 , and the difference is 3 620 nm 310nm .