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References & Edit History Related Topics

Images & Videos

$How does refraction affect the direction of a wave?$

$What is diffraction?$

examples of interference

Figure 18: Progression of elliptically polarized wave (see text).

View an animation explaining how small things like electrons and protons can behave like particles and sometimes like waves

Understand the uncertainty principle as defined by the properties of waves

Understanding Heisenberg's uncertainty principle in subatomic particles

For Students

Read Next

$Light refraction image with a cube. Prism$

How Is Light Both a Particle and a Wave?

A big, powerful wave breaking near the shore.

What Makes a Wave Go Rogue?

VAN, TURKEY - OCTOBER 25: A building and car ruined during the earthquake of Van-Ercis on October 25, 2011 in Van, Turkey. It is 604 killed and 4152 injured in Van-Ercis Earthquake.

What Is an Aftershock?

The LIGO Laboratory operates two detector sites, one near Hanford in eastern Washington, and another near Livingston, Louisiana. This photo shows the Hanford detector site.

6 Amazing Facts About Gravitational Waves and LIGO

Discover

In this aerial photo, structures are damaged and destroyed October 15, 2005 in Balakot, Pakistan. It is estimated that 90% of the city of Balakot was leveled by the earthquake. The death toll in the 7.6 magnitude earthquake that struck northern Pakistan on October 8, 2005 is believed to be 38,000 with at least 1,300 more dead in Indian Kashmir. SEE CONTENT NOTES.

6 of the World’s Deadliest Natural Disasters

Small, white rat (genus Rattus) on a glass table. (rodent, laboratory, experiment)

Cruel and Unusual Punishments: 15 Types of Torture

Attack on Pearl Harbor. December 7, 1941. Pearl Harbor infographic. World War II. Hawaii. United States. Japan. SPOTLIGHT VERSION

Attack on Pearl Harbor Timeline

Young boys working in a thread spinning mill in Macon, Georgia, 1909. Boys are so small they have to climb onto the spinning frame to reach and fix broken threads and put back empty bobbins. Child labor. Industrial revolution

The Rise of the Machines: Pros and Cons of the Industrial Revolution

Sailboat against a beautiful landscape

Which Waters Do You Pass Through When You “Sail the Seven Seas”?

Vietnam War. U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson awards the Distinguished Service Cross to First Lieutenant Marty A. Hammer, during a visit to military personnel, Cam Ranh Bay, South Vietnam, October 26, 1966. President Johnson

Vietnam War Timeline

Remarkable new details of Pluto's largest moon Charon are revealed in this image from New Horizons' Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI), taken late on July 13, 2015 from a distance of 289,000 miles

Why Is Pluto No Longer a Planet?

wave: Related Content

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Photos and Videos

examples of interference

Figure 18: Progression of elliptically polarized wave (see text).

$How does refraction affect the direction of a wave?$

$What is diffraction?$

View an animation explaining how small things like electrons and protons can behave like particles and sometimes like waves

Understand the uncertainty principle as defined by the properties of waves

Understanding Heisenberg's uncertainty principle in subatomic particles

See All Videos and Images →

Topics

radiation electromagnetic radiation sound wave gravitational wave wave motion vibration seismic wave phase longitudinal wave chemical bonding chemical element subatomic particle atom electricity time liquid chemical compound electromagnetism gas

Key People

Helmholtz.

Hermann von Helmholtz

German scientist and philosopher

Kip Thorne

American physicist

Lord Rayleigh, engraving by R. Cottot.

Lord Rayleigh

British scientist

Ernst Mach

Austrian physicist

Quiz

Italian-born physicist Dr. Enrico Fermi draws a diagram at a blackboard with mathematical equations. circa 1950.

Physics and Natural Law