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Question-1. What is a wave?
Answer-1: Transfers energy from one place to another without transferring matter
Question-2. What are the two types of waves?
Answer-2: Transverse and longitudinal
Question-3. What is an example of a transverse wave?
Answer-3: Ripples on the surface of water
Question-4. What is an example of a longitudinal wave?
Answer-4: Sound waves travelling through air
Question-5. What direction are the oscillations of a transverse wave compared to the direction of the energy tra
Answer-5: The oscillations (vibrations) are perpendicular (at 90o) to the direction of energy transfer.
Question-6. What direction are the oscillations of a longitudinal wave compared to the direction of the energy t
Answer-6: The oscillations (vibrations) are parallel to the direction of energy transfer
Question-7. What is the definition of amplitude?
Answer-7: The maximum displacement of a point on a wave away from its undisturbed position.
Question-8. What is the definition of wavelength?
Answer-8: The wavelength of a wave is the distance from a point on one wave to the equivalent point on the adjacent wave.
Question-9. What is the definition of frequency?
Answer-9: The frequency of a wave is the number of waves passing a point each second
Question-10. What is the equation from the physics equation sheet that relates the period of one wave and frequen
Answer-10: period = 1 frequency
Question-11. What is the symbol equation from the physics equation sheet that relates period and frequency?
Answer-11: T = 1 / f
Question-12. What are the units and unit symbol of frequency?
Answer-12: Hertz, Hz
Question-13. What is the wave speed?
Answer-13: The speed at which the energy is transferred through the medium.
Question-14. What is the word equation for wave speed?
Answer-14: wave speed = frequency ? wavelength
Question-15. What is the symbol equation for wave speed?
Answer-15: v = f λ
Question-16. What are the unit and unit symbol of wave speed?
Answer-16: metres per second, m/s
Question-17. What happens to waves at the boundary between materials?
Answer-17: They can be reflected, absorbed or transmitted.
Question-18. What is a normal line?
Answer-18: An imaginary line thats perpendicular to the surface at the point where the wave hits the surface
Question-19. What is the relationship between the angles of incidence and reflection?
Answer-19: Angle of incidence = angle of reflection Rarefaction Compression
Question-20. What is specular reflection?
Answer-20: When a wave is reflected in a single direction by a smooth surface (e.g. a mirror) and you get a clear reflection
Question-21. What is diffuse reflection?
Answer-21: When a wave is reflected by a rough surface (e.g. a piece of paper) and the rays are scattered in lots of different directions
Question-22. How do sound waves travel through solids?
Answer-22: Vibrations in the solid cause the sound wave to travel
Question-23. How do humans hear sounds?
Answer-23: The sounds waves cause the ear drum and other parts of the ear to vibrate, causing a sensation of sound
Question-24. Why can humans hear only a limited range of sounds?
Answer-24: Human hearing is limited by the size and shape of our ear drum as well as the structure of all the parts in the ear that vibrate
Question-25. What is a reflected sound called?
Answer-25: An echo
Question-26. What is the range of normal human hearing?
Answer-26: 20 Hz to 20 kHz
Question-27. What are ultrasound waves?
Answer-27: Ultrasound waves have a frequency higher than the upper limit of hearing for humans (frequencies above 20, 000 Hz)
Question-28. What happens when ultrasound waves meet a boundary between two different media?
Answer-28: They are partially reflected
Question-29. What does it mean when an ultrasound is described as partially reflected?
Answer-29: Some of the wave is reflected off the boundary between the two media, and some is transmitted (and refracted)
Question-30. How can partial reflection be used in ultrasound to determine how far away a boundary between one su
Answer-30: By the time taken for the reflections to reach a detector
Question-31. What can ultrasound waves be used for?
Answer-31: Medical and industrial imaging
Question-32. What are seismic waves?
Answer-32: Waves produced by earthquakes
Question-33. What are P-waves?
Answer-33: P-waves are longitudinal, seismic waves. P-waves travel at different speeds through solids and liquids.
Question-34. What are S-waves?
Answer-34: S-waves are transverse, seismic waves
Question-35. Which type of media are S-waves unable to travel through?
Answer-35: Liquids
Question-36. What do P-waves and S-waves provide evidence for?
Answer-36: The structure and size of the Earths core, which are not easily observable
Question-37. How are waves used to detect objects in deep water and measure water depth?
Answer-37: Echo sounding, using high frequency sound waves
Question-38. What are electromagnetic waves?
Answer-38: Transverse waves that transfer energy from the source of the waves to an absorber
Question-39. What is the velocity of all electromagnetic waves through a vacuum?
Answer-39: 300 000 000 m/s (3.0 x 108 m/s)
Question-40. What is the only electromagnetic waves our eyes are able to detect?
Answer-40: Visible light
Question-41. What is a practical application for radio waves?
Answer-41: Television and radio
Question-42. Why are microwaves used for satellite communications?
Answer-42: They are able to pass through the Earths atmosphere
Question-43. What is a practical application for infrared?
Answer-43: Electrical heaters, cooking food, infrared cameras
Question-44. What is a practical application for visible light?
Answer-44: Fibre optic communications
Question-45. What is a practical application for ultraviolet?
Answer-45: Energy efficient lamps, sun tanning
Question-46. What is a practical application for x-rays and gamma rays?
Answer-46: Medical imgaing and treatments
Question-47. What happens when a wave crosses a boundary between different materials at an angle and what is this
Answer-47: They speed up or slow down and it changes directions ? called refraction
Question-48. Why do waves refract when they enter different substances?
Answer-48: They speed up of slow down
Question-49. What does the size of refraction depend on?
Answer-49: How much the wave speeds up or slows down
Question-50. What happens to a wave if it crosses a boundary at an angle and slows down?
Answer-50: It bends towards the normal
Question-51. What happens to a wave if it crosses a boundary at an angle and speeds up?
Answer-51: It bends away from the normal
Question-52. What happens to the wavelength and frequency of a wave when it is refracted?
Answer-52: The wavelength changes, but the frequency stays the same
Question-53. How can radio waves be produced?
Answer-53: Oscillations in electrical circuits
Question-54. What is the object called in which charges oscillate to create the radio waves?
Answer-54: A transmitter
Question-55. What is the frequency of the waves produced by a transmitter the same as?
Answer-55: The frequency of the alternating current in the electrical circuit
Question-56. What happens when transmitted radio waves reach a receiver?
Answer-56: They are absorbed
Question-57. What happens to the energy that is being carried by the radio waves when it reaches a receiver?
Answer-57: It is transferred to the electrons in the material of the receiver and causes them to oscillate at the same frequency as the radio wave that generated it
Question-58. How are electromagnetic waves related to atoms and nuclei?
Answer-58: Changes in atoms and the nuclei of atoms can result in electromagnetic waves being generated or absorbed
Question-59. Where do gamma rays originate from?
Answer-59: Changes in the nucleus of an atom
Question-60. What is radiation dose?
Answer-60: Radiation dose is a measure of the risk of harm resulting from an exposure of the body to the radiation.
Question-61. What are the units of radiation dose?
Answer-61: Sieverts, Sv
Question-62. How many millisieverts (mSv) make up 1 sievert (Sv)?
Answer-62: 1000 millisieverts (mSv) = 1 sievert (Sv)
Question-63. What effect do ultraviolet waves have on skin?
Answer-63: They can cause it to age prematurely and they increase the risk of skin cancer.
Question-64. Which types of EM radiation are ionising?
Answer-64: X-rays and gamma rays
Question-65. What effects can ionising radiation have on the body?
Answer-65: They can cause mutation of genes and cancer
Question-66. What are the two different types of lens?
Answer-66: Convex and concave
Question-67. What is the definition of converging and which lens does this apply to?
Answer-67: Brought together, convex
Question-68. What is the definition of diverging and which lens does this apply to?
Answer-68: Spread out, concave
Question-69. How do convex lenses form an image?
Answer-69: Parallel rays of light are brought together (converge) at the principal focus
Question-70. Where is the principle focus of a convex lens?
Answer-70: Where rays hitting the lens parallel to the axis all meet
Question-71. Where is the principle focus of a concave lens?
Answer-71: The point where rays hitting the lens parallel to the axis appear to all come from. You have to trace them back until they appear to meet up.
Question-72. What is the focal length?
Answer-72: The distance from the lens to the principal focus
Question-73. What is a real image?
Answer-73: One that can be shown on a screen
Question-74. What is a virtual image?
Answer-74: One that does not exist, and only appears to
Question-75. What can you not do with a virtual image?
Answer-75: Project it onto a screen
Question-76. What type of image does a convex (converging) lens produce?
Answer-76: Real or virtual
Question-77. What type of image does a concave (diverging) lens produce?
Answer-77: Virtual only
Question-78. What is the equation from the Physics equation sheet for magnification?
Answer-78: Magnification = image height / object height
Question-79. What are the units for image height and object height?
Answer-79: mm or cm
Question-80. What are the units of magnification?
Answer-80: Magnification is a ratio and so has no units
Question-81. How does the distance the object is from a convex lens affect the image?
Answer-81: An object at 2F will produce a real, inverted image the same size as the object An object between F and 2F will produce a real, inverted image that is bigger than the object An object nearer than F will make a virtual image the right way up, bigger than the object
Question-82. What is the difference between the colours in the visible light spectrum?
Answer-82: They each have their own narrow band of wavelength and frequency
Question-83. What is the word for reflection from a smooth surface in a single direction?
Answer-83: Specular reflection
Question-84. What is the word for reflection from a rough surface?
Answer-84: Diffuse reflection
Question-85. How do colour filters work?
Answer-85: By absorbing certain wavelengths (and colour) and transmitting other wavelengths (and colour)
Question-86. What is an opaque object?
Answer-86: An object in which no light is transmitted
Question-87. What determines the colour of an opaque object?
Answer-87: By which wavelengths of light are more strongly reflected
Question-88. What happens to the colours hitting an opaque object that are not reflected?
Answer-88: They are absorbed
Question-89. When does an object appear white?
Answer-89: When all wavelengths of light are reflected equally
Question-90. When does an object appear black?
Answer-90: When all wavelengths of light are absorbed
Question-91. What is the definition of transparent?
Answer-91: An object that is see through
Question-92. What is the definition of translucent?
Answer-92: An object that is partially see through
Question-93. What words are used to describe objects which transmit light?
Answer-93: Transparent or translucent
Question-94. What radiation do all objects, no matter what temperature, emit & absorb?
Answer-94: Infrared
Question-95. What can be said about the amount of radiation a hot body emits?
Answer-95: The hotter the body, the more infrared radiation it radiates in a given time
Question-96. What is a perfect black body?
Answer-96: An object that absorbs all of the radiation incident on it. No radiation is reflected or transmitted.
Question-97. What type of object is the best possible emitter of radiation?
Answer-97: A perfect black body
Question-98. What can be said about the rate that an object absorbs and emits radiation?
Answer-98: A body at constant temperature is absorbing radiation at the same rate as it is emitting radiation.
Question-99. When does the temperature of a body increase?
Answer-99: The temperature of a body increases when the body absorbs radiation faster than it emits radiation
Question-100. What factors affect the temperature of the Earth?
Answer-100: The rates of absorption and emission of radiation; Reflection of radiation into space
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