What are the sources to back your answers up? web site urls would be helpful.
2006-07-25 08:24:02 · 8 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Other - Science
no, don't need a website....it's called basic education.
2006-07-25 08:27:15 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
The speed of light in a vacuum is the theoretical limit for speed in the universe, and is one of those physics fundamentals. However, in dense materials the speed of light is substantially lower. The speed in some special materials like excited cesium gas and Bose-Einstein Condensates is extremely slow (once recorded at 17m/s). Different colors of light do travel through mediums at different speeds (as one answerer correctly mentioned for prisms), so since the atmosphere is denser than a vacuum, the speed of light emitted from your laser will depend on the light generated in that laser.
Curiously, mass can travel faster than the speed of light in some materials and can be seen in environments with VERY high radiation. The "glow" that's famously attributed to radioactive materials, known as Cherekov radiation, is due to charged particles being emitted from that material faster than the speed of light in the surrounding medium.
2006-07-25 19:06:32 · answer #2 · answered by Entropy 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Of course, the velocity of light does vary with the frequency (i.e. colour). If this were not the case we would not get prisms to split a beam of white light into its constituent colours. You can go through all the indexes of refractions calculations you want but they will only tell you that the beam will bend but will not explain how the beam splits apart until you also allow that different frequencies travel at different speeds.
Light in a vacuum is a different matter -there you would not find a different velocity for each colour.
2006-07-25 16:06:01 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
All forms of electromagnetic radiation (all colors and wavelengths of light) have the same velocity. The speed of light, c, is 3.00X10^8 m/s.
2006-07-25 15:28:39 · answer #4 · answered by hcbiochem 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Nope.
The speed of light in a vacuum is a constant.
2006-07-25 20:26:48 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
Not in a vacuum. See:
http://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=3872
2006-07-25 15:31:38 · answer #6 · answered by williegod 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
uh light goes at one speed and one speed only. the wavelength differs though.
2006-07-25 16:14:16 · answer #7 · answered by shiara_blade 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
no ... speed of light is, for almost all intents and purposes, constant.
2006-07-25 15:29:36 · answer #8 · answered by twinsfan 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋