NAME:- kannuri bharadwaj

CLASS:- 12TH A
ROLL NO. :-
SUBJECT:- Physics
TOPIC:- TOTAL INTERNAL REFLECTION AND
IT’S APPLICATION
TEACHER:- MRS.Sarita
SCHOOL NAME:- KV CRPF
 Certificate

This is to certify that the investigatory Project Report

entitled “Total Internal Reflection” submitted by
Shubham Ojha student of Class XII ‘A’ is original and has
been completed by him under my supervision and is
completed in all respect for AISSCE -2022-2023

(Signature of Lecturer in Physics)

 Contents

1. Certificate
2. Introduction
3. Total Internal Reflection
4. Conditions for Total Internal Reflection
5. Relation between refractive index () and critical angle
(C)
6. Applications of Total Internal Reflection
7. Uses
8. Bibliography
 Introduction

Whenever a ray of incident light travels from one medium

to another, its path is changed i.e. it gets refracted.
If the ray travels from denser medium to rarer medium, it
suffers deviation away from the normal at the point of
incidence. As the angle of incidence is increased, the angle
of refraction also keeps on increasing. At a certain angle of
incidence, called the critical angle, the refracted ray grazes
along the surface of separation i.e. angle of refraction
becomes just go. If the angle of incidence is further
increased, no refraction takes place. Instead such a ray gets
reflection inside the medium itself. This phenomenon is
called total internal reflection.
Refraction :
The phenomenon of bending of light when it come from
one medium to another medium is called refraction.
Reflection :
The phenomenon in which a ray comes from one medium
and bending of that ray in same medium i.e. Total Internal
Reflection takes place called reflection.
 Total Internal Reflection

Total internal reflection is the phenomenon of reflection of

light which occurs when a ray of light traveling in a denser
medium is incident at the interfere of the two media at an
angle greater than the critical angle for that pair of media.
Consider a surface xy separates the rarer medium a from
the denser medium b. A ray of light OA from the object O
in denser medium incident normally on the surface of
separation, gets refracted into the rarer medium as such
along AL. Another ray of light incident along the oblique
path OA, is refracted away from normal along the path
A1B1 in rarer medium. As the angle of incidence is
increased, the angle of refraction also goes on increasing,
till for a certain angle of incidence C, called the critical
angle. When angle of incidence is greater than critical
angle then total internal reflection takes place.
 Conditions for Total Internal
Reflection

1. The ray incident on the interface should travel in

optically denser medium.
2. The angle of incidence should be greater than the critical
angle for the given pair of media.

Relation between refractive index () and critical angle (C)

When refraction takes place at point C, it follows that the
refractive index of medium a w.r.t. medium b is given by
ba=
ab=
if i = c (critical angle)
r = 90o
ab=
Refractive index is inversely proportional to sin of critical
angle.
Its relation with polarizing angle :
According to Brewster’s Law, when light is incident at
polarizing angle at the interface of a refracting medium, the
refractive index of the medium is equal to the tengent of
the polarizing angle.
If P is polarizing angle and u, the refractive index of the
refracting medium, then u = tan P.
 Applications of Total Internal
Reflection
1. Totally Reflection Prism :
To deviate a ray of light through 90o and 180o.
A right angled isosceles prism can be used to cause total
internal reflection. In such a right angled prism when a ray
of light is incident normally to its face AB, it passes into
prism as incidence is 45o. But for glass (m = 1.5), the value
of critical angle is about 41.8o. Since the value of incident
angle is greater than the critical angle for glass, the ray of
right suffers total internal refection. As a result, it gets
incident on the force AC at 90o and comes out of the prism
as such. It follows that the path of the ray of right was been
deviated by the prism through 90o.
The path of a ray undergoing a deviation of 90o due to one
internal reflection but in same way and by same process
due to two internal reflection, a ray can be deviated through
180o. This arrangement is used in prism-binoculars.

Advantages of Totally Reflecting Prism over the

Silvered Plane Mirror.
• A reflecting prism does not require any silvering.
• A silvered plane mirror always absorbs some light. In a
good mirror, the reflection of light about 90-95%.
However, in a reflecting prism, almost 100% reflection is
secured.
Due to imperfect and non-uniform silvering of the mirror, the
image obtained with a mirror is oftenly not of a good quality.

2. Mirage :
It is an optical illusion observed in desert in a hot day.
The object such as tree is observed inverted and observer
gets an impression that there is a pool of water. This
phenomena is known as mirage.
Due to intense heat, the surface of earth becomes quite
hot and the temperature of air near the surface of earth is
max. The temp of the other layers of the air goes on
decreasing as one goes up. Dimity as well as refractive
index of air increases slightly for higher layers. Thus a
ray of light traveling from point O of a tree passes
through air of gradually decreasing refractive index and
is therefore refracted more and more away from the
normal and accordingly the angle of incidence goes on
increasing. At a layer, when the angle of incidence
becomes greater than the critical angle, total internal
reflection takes place. Then the ray of light starts
traversing layers of increasing refractive index and goes
on bending more and more towards the normal.
Ultimately, when the ray reaches the eye of the observer,
it appears to be coming from the point I. Hence the
inverted image of the tree produces the impression of
reflection from a pool of water.

3. Brilliance of Diamonds and Other Precious Stones:

 Diamond shines very brightly because it has a very high
refractive index and very low critical angle i.e. = 2.47 &
C = 230 . Dur to low critical angle, a diamond cut so as
to have a large number of faces, such that a ray of light
entering it from one face undergoes repeated total
internal reflections from other faces. As a result, the
faces through which the light emerges, shine very
brilliantly.

4. Optical Fibres :
In 1870, John Tyndall, a British physicist demonstrated
that light could be made to follow curved path along a
thin stream of water coming out of a water tank. This
effect was made use of an illuminated fountains. The
light follows curved path it suffers a series of total
internal reflections.

Optical fibres commits of thousands of strands of a very

fine quality glass or quartz of refractive index about 1.7
or so. The thickness of a strand is about 10-6 cm. The
strands are coated with a layer of some material of lower
refractive index (m=1.5).

When light is incident at a small angle at are end, it gets

refracted into strands and gets incident on the interface of
the fibres and the coating. The angle of incidence being
greater than critical angle, the ray of light undergoes total
internal reflections. Each fibre act as a pipe and such a
bundle of fibres can be used to convey images along paths
of any shape. The optical fibre does not bend light. Instead,
light follows the zin-zag path through the fibres.

5. Looming :
It is an optical illusion observed in the cold countries. In
which observers get an impression that object is placed in
air.
 Uses
i) Optical fibres are used inn the field of communication
and the computers.
ii) The optical fibres are used for making medical
investigation.
iii) The optical fibre sensors have been used to measure
temperature and pressure.
iv) The optical are used for transmitting the optical signals
and the two dimensional pictures.
v) The optical fibre in the form of photometric sensors are
used for measuring the blood flow in the heart.
vi) The optical fibre in the form of refract meters are used
to determine the refractive indices of liquids.
vii) Optical fibre are used in telephone and other
transmitting cables.
viii) Optical fibre are used in transmission and reception of
electrical signals by converting them first into light signal.
 Bibliography
1. Modern’s abc of Physics.
2. GOOGLE.COM
3. YOUTUBE.COM

THANK YOU