Duke University Department of Physics Physics 143 Fall Term 2007

PRACTICE QUIZ 1 SOLUTIONS

Problem 1: Red light from a laser ( = 632.8 nm) is incident on a screen containing two very narrow horizontal slits separated by 0.200 mm. A fringe pattern appears on a white piece of paper held 1.00 m away. a. Approximately how far, in mm, above and below the central axis are the rst dark stripes? b. How far from the central axis is the 5th bright band? c. Describe/sketch qualitatively what happens to the pattern if more equally-spaced slits are added to the screen. Solution:

a. For 2-slit interference, waves are out of phase for d sin = (m+1/2), so the rst minima are for m = 0. sin y/L, where L is the distance to the viewing screen. Solving for y = L/2d, we get y = 1.58 mm. b. For 2-slit interference, waves in phase for d sin = m. The 5th maximum is for m = 5. y = mL/d, and plugging in we get y = 1.58 cm. c. With more slits, there are maxima at the same places as for the double-slit experiment, and smaller maxima and minima occupy the spaces between them. As the number of slits increases, the main maxima get brighter and the secondary maxima get both more numerous and dimmer. Eventually, for a very large number of slits, there is essentially no light between bright maxima.

Problem 2: How fast must a meter stick be moving if its length is observed to shrink to 0.5 m? Solution: Proper length L0 is 1 m. L = L0 /, so = 2. For = for v gives v = Problem 3: Find the speed of a particle whose total energy is 50% greater than its rest energy. Solution: Since total energy is E = mc2 , and rest energy is mc2 , then is 3/2. Solving for v using denition of gives v = 35 c. Problem 4: Calculate the binding energy per nucleon in the isotope 12 C. Note that 6 the mass of this isotope is exactly 12 u, and the masses of the proton and neutron are 1.007276 u and 1.008665 u respectively. Solution: Mc2 + BE = mi c2 , so BE = (6(1.00727 u) + 6(1.008665 u) 12u)c2 and BE = 0.0957 u c2 . So the binding energy per nucleon is 0.0957 u c2 = 12 7.975 103 u c2 . Problem 5: The cathode in a photoelectric apparatus is illuminated by two beams of light. Both beams have equal intensity, but each beam has a dierent wavelength. The photons of one beam have an energy E1 = 1.1W and the
3 c. 2 1 , 1v2 /c2

solving

photons of the other beam have an energy E2 = 1.2W , where W is the work function of the metal making up the photocathode. a. Sketch the photocurrent as a function of the voltage applied between the cathode and anode. Remember to label your axes and also label any interesting features of your sketch. b. If the intensity of both beams is doubled, are the emitted electrons more energetic? Explain. Solution:

a. For either beam: the stopping voltage is an opposing (negative) voltage corresponding to the maximum kinetic energy available, eV = Kmax = E W where E is the photon beam energy: at this voltage there is no current. As the voltage is increased (made less negative), the current increases until V = 0, at which point the current is maximum corresponding to all the photoelectrons available for this intensity. [Note that we did not discuss the way in which the current increases; this is not important here though, so any sketch of current increase over the appropriate range is ne.] Each photon of either color produces a single electron, so the currents due to the two beams should just add. The rst one turns on at V1 = (E1 W )/e = 0.1W/e, and the second one turns on at V2 = (E2 W )/e = 0.2W/e. b. Doubling the power of the beam corresponds to increasing the number of incident photons, without changing the frequency; since the energy per photon is hf , the available energy for emitted electrons remains unchanged. Problem 6: Describe the condition for an object to be a perfect blackbody, and explain why we call the radiation emitted from hot objects blackbody radiation.

Photocurrent I I1 I total = I 1 + I 2

0.1W/e

Applied voltage V

I2

0.2W/e0.1W/e

0.2W/e

Solution: A perfect blackbody has perfect absorption, i.e. the fraction of radiation incident upon it is 100%. In equilibrium, the rate of absorption is the rate of emission. Objects radiate electromagnetic waves when heated; for a blackbody in equilibrium, e = a K() where e is the emissivity and K is the incident intensity distribution. For blackbody radiation, we make the approximation that a = 1, which in real life is not too bad an approximation. Problem 7: In your laboratory, you determine the total energy per unit area etotal emitted by a black body radiation source as a function of its temperature T . You assign an error T to the measurement of the temperature of the blackbody. What error should you assign to your measurement of etotal due to your error in measured temperature? Solution: Since e = T 4 , e = 4T 3 T , so e/e = 4T /T . Problem 8:

Explain how a slit of width L might be considered wide for helium nuclei passing through it, yet at the same time narrow for electrons passing through it? Solution: A slit is wide or narrow depending on the de Broglie wavelength of the particle, = h/p, where p is the momentum. The wavelength of a helium nucleus is much smaller than that of an electron of the same velocity, so a slit will appear wide to a helium nucleus while it will be narrow for an electron.