With light, also comes refraction. Refraction is the change in direction of a wave passing from one medium to the other. Refraction holds true for light, sound waves and water waves too.
Here’s a simple experiment to understand how refraction works.
What you need:
- A beaker
- Water
- Canola Oil
- A glass stick
Steps:
- Pour some water and oil into a beaker.
- Place the glass stick and observe what happens
The part of the stick in the region of the oil becomes invisible!
This experiment works because here the light is passing through the glass (one medium) to the canola oil (another medium).
The refractive index of the glass stick and the oil is the same, so the light waves do not change much and the glass stick seems to disappear in oil but not in water!
