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Methods for Producing Plane Polarized Light

The document outlines four methods for producing plane polarized light: reflection, refraction, double refraction, and selective absorption. Reflection involves the partial polarization of light at specific angles, while double refraction occurs in certain crystals that produce two polarized rays. Selective absorption, or dichroism, occurs when unpolarized light is absorbed differently by a crystal, resulting in plane polarized light.

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204 views3 pages

Methods for Producing Plane Polarized Light

The document outlines four methods for producing plane polarized light: reflection, refraction, double refraction, and selective absorption. Reflection involves the partial polarization of light at specific angles, while double refraction occurs in certain crystals that produce two polarized rays. Selective absorption, or dichroism, occurs when unpolarized light is absorbed differently by a crystal, resulting in plane polarized light.

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Methods of producing plane polarized light

The different methods of producing plane polarized light are


i. Reflection
ii. Refraction
iii. Double refraction and
iv. Selective absorption

1. Polarization by Reflection:-
When ordinary or unpolarized light is made to fall on the surface,
(transparent) part of the light is reflected and the other part is refracted.
For small angles of incidence the reflected ray is partially
polarized. The degree of polarization depends on the angle of incidence.
As angle of incidence is increased, the degree of polarization also
increases. For one particular angle of incidence called the polarizing
angle P θ , the reflected light is completely plane polarized. This was
discovered by Malus in the Year 1808. Later Brewster showed that at
polarizing angle P θ , the reflected and refracted light are perpendicular
to each other. Polarized reflected light has vibrations parallel to surface
and perpendicular to the plane of paper. The refracted ray is partially
polarized.
2. Polarization by pile of plates:-
Plane polarized light can be produced using pile of plates arrangement.
The pile of plates arrangement consists of number of thin glass plates
placed parallel to one another obliquely inside a hallow tube. When a
beam of unpolarized light is incident on the 1st plate at polarizing angle,
the 1st glass plate reflects 15% of the incident vibrations lying in a plane
perpendicular to the plane of incidence and transmits 85% of them 100%
of the vibrations in the plane of incidence are transmitted. This process is
repeated at each glass plate. As a result the light emerging out of the last
plate is nearly 100% plane polarized

3- Polarization by Double refraction:-


Certain crystals like quartz, mica, calcite have the property of producing
two refracted rays for every ray that is incident on them.
The phenomenon of refraction where in two refracted rays are produced
for a given incident ray is called double refraction or birefringence. The
two refracted rays are plane polarized in mutual perpendicular planes. By
eliminating one of the them, plane polarized light can be obtained. The
crystals which exhibit this property are called doubly refracting crystals.

4- Polarization by Selective absorption (or) Dichroism:-


When unpolarized light is incident on a doubly refracting crystal it splits
up into ordinary and extra-ordinary ray that are plane polarized in
mutually perpendicular planes. As these rays pass through a crystal of
suitable thickness, they are absorbed to different extents. This property is
called as dichroism. And the crystal is said to be dichroic.
E. g. Tourmaline crystal

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