Can anyone help me understand the concept of what a wave is? (as in microwaves, not ocean waves)?

Question

I took chemistry and some physics. I can do calculations concerning waves, but I don't understand what waves are conceptually. Can anyone help? It would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

Microwaves and ocean waves share one common characteristic:
It is the transfer of energy through a medium. The waves have a variable intensity. For a microwave it is electromagnetic energy traveling at the speed of light with a frequency in the giga-hertz range. For an ocean wave is the transfer of mechanical energy at a frequency of 1 per 30 seconds or so. The height of the wave is proportional to the amount of energy and the depth of the water.

In the case of communications, the microwave energy is modulated to transmit information according to the modulation protocol and frequency.

I hope that helps.

By the way, microwave energy is used in microwave ovens because the frequency of the microwave causes the water molecules in the food to react and heat. This is because the water molecule is a bipolar molecule with a resonanat frequency that gets matched up to the microwave and thus converts the electromagnetic energy into kinetic energy, which gets converted to heat.

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Answer 2

Okay, well conceptually microwaves and ocean waves are the same! Surprised? The idea of waves being used to describe the behaviour of electromagnetic radiation comes from the fact that they exhibit a property similar to frequency and wavelength and that they transport energy, just like ocean waves. Ocean waves are a very good way of imagining how the wave theory of light etc works (transverse waves), whereas sound waves are longitudinal.

Answer 3

Well - waves are waves - no matter if they are waves in the ocean or soundwaves or as you said microwaves.
I find it to actually be the easiest way to understand "what waves are" to study the ocean or water.
The first thing to understand is that wave is NOT a material or a state of a matter (such as gas) - wave is basically movement.
Sometimes childrensbooks are a great source for understanding complicated things - after all they are written with the goal to make someone understand - it seems not all books are written in that purpose.
Sorry for my bad english - I´m from Sweden

Answer 4

Hi! If you understand water waves, it is not difficult to follow any other type of wave.

What is wave formation in water? Say you take a bowl filled with water. Drop one drop of water from height in this bowl. What happens? Waves are formed? How? Kinetic energy of last drop added at a height in the bowl is distributed in the content of bowl.
This energy is equally distributed to all adjacent molecules of water where it made hit in the bowl. Now those molecules will try to loose the external energy by passing it on to their neighbors...and the chain continues... That is how the waves are formed.

In a microwave, when you connect external power supply, electrical energy is converted to heat/microwave energy at a very high frequency(short wavelength) that can pass thorough the food cooking the food in microwave oven.

The principle remains same.

Answer 5

Sound can be expressed as how loud and what pitch. A wave form has amplitude (loudness) and it has frequency(pitch). When you plot amplitude and frequency versus time on a 2 dimensional graph you get a waveform. This is how different forms of energy can be plotted. Changing the frequency in light causes the color to change. Changing the frequency in infared energy can cause the kinetic energy to change in materials, such as the vibration of different molecular bonds.

Answer 6

Gravity from the sunlight and moon reasons tides. maximum waves are led to via wind. with the aid of comparable theory that keeps airplanes flying, whilst air blows over a ripple on the exterior of the physique of water it reasons low air tension on the crest of the wave and intense air tension interior the trough. This reasons the wave to alter into greater desirable. once you have sustained winds pushing waves over miles of open ocean you may get very, very great waves. some waves are led to via underwater landslides or earthquakes. those waves are referred to as tsunamis.