Please help with optics question

Hello, and welcoem cuti pie

Well using Snell's law you could get the angle of refraction...

n1*sin(theta1) = n2*sin(theta2)

where n = dialectric constant (for air, n=1)
and for this glass, n= 1.5

theta1 = angle that a ray approximation of the light wave meets the interface

theta2 = angle that it leaves

where theta is measured with respect to the perpendicular of the interface

I believe that the degree of polarization refers to the phase difference between the incident and the refracted wave.

However....it looks their information is only enough to evaulate the ray approximation! so maybe they really just want the angle of the refracted ray? perhaps I am wrong and there is a way to determine the phase difference, though...

randomly polarized light reflecting off of a flat surface will be polarized somewhat in the horizontal direction. This is the reason for polarized sunglasses (sunglasses that block mostly this horizontal polarization). These sunglasses block a large degree of the glare off the road while still allowing enough horizontally polarized light through to see everything else.

Rather than trying to get all of the symbols to appear properly, I'll just link you to this page for the equations.

Hi Methos,

Thank you for referring me to the website...it's very clear although not detail enough to answer the question...but it's alright...at least got me thinking. :wink:

So thank u!

>>>>>> n1*sin(theta1) = n2*sin(theta2) <<<<<<

Seems that page leaves out the most important part, sorry.

Using R(par) for that first R term and R(per) for that second R term parallel and perpendicular), the equation for degree of polarization (P) is

P = [R(par) - R(per)] / [R(par) + R(per)]

You usually multiply this by 100% to express it as a percent. In case it is not clear, tg in the equation in the link is tangent. You should now have all the equations and values necessary to solve the problem. I don't always come here all that often, but if you have questions about what value to plug in where, post them.