Page:Light waves and their uses.djvu/69

Rh passing from air into the medium in question. But if this number is identical with the ratio of the velocities, the index would evidently be determined if we knew the ratio of the wave lengths, since the wave lengths are also proportional to the velocities. This can be obtained by the interferometer. In fact, the original name of the instrument is "interferential refractometer," because it was first used for this purpose by Fresnel and Arago in 1816. This name, however, is as cumbersome as it is inappropriate, for, as we shall see, the range of usefulness of the instrument is by no means limited to this sort of measurement.

The interferometer being adjusted for white light, the colored interference fringes are thrown on the screen. If, now, the number of waves in one of the paths be altered by interposing a piece of glass, the adjustment will be disturbed and the fringes will disappear; for the difference of path thus introduced is several hundreds or thousands of waves; and, as shown in the preceding lecture, the fringes appear in white light only when the difference of path is very small.

The exact number of waves introduced can readily be shown to be 2(n−1)$t⁄l$; that is, twice the product of the index less unity by the thickness of the glass divided by the length of the light wave. Thus, if the index of the glass plate is one and one-half and its thickness one millimeter, and the wave length one-half micron, the difference in path would be two thousand waves.

Let us take, therefore, an extremely thin piece of mica, or a glass film such as may be obtained by blowing a