When a photon descontructively interfers with itself where does the energy go?
2007-12-15 05:51:46 · 4 answers · asked by Phillip 3 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
Whenever such interference takes place, there is always another direction in which the energy is channeled. For example, if beams A and B are combined with a half-silvered mirror and transmitted A destructively interferes with reflected B, then reflected B constructively interferes with transmitted A resulting is all the original beam power going that way.
2007-12-21 04:19:19 · answer #1 · answered by Dr. R 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hi. Great question! From the web "OUT OF PHASE: Here wave 1 and wave 2 are said to have a phase difference of pi, or simply are out of phase, because wave 2 looks like wave 1 shifted half of its period to the right. Any two waves with a phase difference of an odd multiple of pi are out of phase (pi, 3pi, 5pi,...).
http://www.math.ubc.ca/~cass/courses/m309-03a/m309-projects/krzak/interference.html
"This leads to deconstructive interference, and since wave 1 and wave 2 also have the same amplitude, the waves completely cancel each other out and the resultant wave has an amplitude of zero."
This really does not fully answer the question. My opinion.
2007-12-15 14:01:37 · answer #2 · answered by Cirric 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Great question. Refer to this website.
http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/primer/lightandcolor/interferenceintro.html
2007-12-15 14:30:58 · answer #3 · answered by Rector 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
energy can neither be created nor can be destroyed
2007-12-15 15:10:13 · answer #4 · answered by Ahmed Zia 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋