RE: More on Speed of Light
Carrigan, Ken ( (no email) )
Tue, 5 Oct 1999 08:00:57 -0400
There are two aspects which one has to consider when looking
at this type Phenomena . First is the speed of the 'quanta' and
next is the frequency or vibration state of the 'quanta'. Light
waves for example has a very very high frequency in the micrometers
or nanometers, where Radio Waves have characteristics of meters
to millimeters for vibration states. All these waves are what is
termed by Maxwell as "ElectroMagnetic" waves. The maximum 'speed'
of these waves can not exceed the speed of light, however, they
can be slowed down in some types of media. The frequency or
vibration state of the wave does not change, unless hitting a
moving object and then a doppler type of phenomena happens to the
wave - changing the frequency slightly. Take Coax cable for
example, the EM wave does not travel at "C" but slightly less
because of the permeativity of the dielectric surrounding the
copper conductor. The EM wave travels on the 'skin' of this
copper conductor. As the frequency of the EM increases, it is
harder to keep on wave contained on a surface, as it tries to
leave into the air.
Shining sunlight on a prism will not 'slowdown' an EM wave but
will act as a filter to separate the different frequencies of
'broadband light' into their separate spectrums. This is similar
to a spectrum analyzer, where you can see the separate frequencies
which make up a time domain EM waveform.
Hope this helps a bit!
v/r Ken Carrigan
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