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Wavefront
Wavefront
A wavefront is a surface made up of a series of peaks of parallel waves that are in phase.
When we look out at the sea and see waves, what part of the waves, do we see?
Let's look at water waves. What kind of waves are they? Answer either transverse or longitudinal.
When we look out to sea, we see the peaks of waves. When we look at water waves from above, we also see the peaks. We can imagine a straight line going through all the peaks, as seen in figure 2.
We call these lines wavefronts. Think about them as "frontlines" of waves, rolling onto the beach.
What is the distance between the peaks of a wave called?
What do you think might be the distance between the wavefronts of waves?
When we look at waves from above, we don't see individual waves. What do we see?
We say multiple waves are in phase when their peaks and troughs are aligned. Do you think the waves that make up wavefronts are in phase or out of phase?
When a pebble is dropped in water, it produces waves.
These go outwards from where the pebble was dropped, forming concentric circles.
The concentric circles we see are the wavefronts of the waves produced by the pebble. Are these waves parallel or not parallel to each other?
Waves that form wavefronts are all ...
We can observe wavefronts when a series of waves are...
To sum up!
A wavefront is defined as a surface made up of a series of peaks of parallel waves that are in phase.