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6 Mar 2010 16:49:26 IST

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can you explain Huygen'sprinciple

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can you explain Huygen'sprinciple

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winx

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Joined: 28 Jan 2010

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6 Mar 2010 17:07:40 IST

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the principle states that>>>

Every point of a wave front may be considered the source of secondary wavelets that spread out in all directions with a speed equal to the speed of propagation of the waves.

What this means is that when you have a wave, you can view the "edge" of the wave as actually creating a series of circular waves. These waves combine together in most cases to just continue the propagation, but in some cases there are significant observable effects. The wave front can be viewed as the line tangent to all of these circular waves.

animated wavefront

Suresh Kumar

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Joined: 24 Aug 2009

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9 Mar 2010 14:45:50 IST

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hello dear

Huygens's Principle:
every point on a propagating wavefront serves as the source of spherical secondary wavelets, such that the wavefront at some later time is the envelope of these wavelets. If the propagating wave has a frequency, f, and is transmitted through the medium at a speed, v, then the secondary wavelets will have the same frequency and speed.

This principle is quite useful, for from it can be derived the laws of reflection and refraction [the latter often referred to as Snell's Law].

http://www.mathpages.com/home/kmath242/kmath242.htm

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