Light

Content of Lecture
1. The double nature of light (particulates – photons - and electromagnetic waves)
2. Velocity of Light (speed of propagation, wavelength and frequency)
3. The Electromagnetic Spectrum
4. The Paradox of the Dual Nature of Light, the Max Planck photons
5. The mathematical solution of the paradox and Maxwell relationship
6. Photon interaction with matter
7. SPECTROSCOPY (light absorption)
8. Photometry (colorimetery and spectroscopy, spectrophotometery)
9. Absorption, Emission, Scattering
10. Light Absorption and chemical analysis
11. Physics of Photosynthesis
12. Beer and Lambert Law

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8.1 The nature of light
• Importance of light can hardly be overestimated in everyday life,
photosynthesis, scientific studies and analytical measurement.
• Astronomers generally cannot conduct experiments. They are
only allowed to collect and analyze light from distant objects.
Light carries information about luminosity, temperature,
composition and velocity of celestial objects.

Light Nature
Light may be thought of as “particles of energy” that move through
space with “wavelike properties”; this is known as the double
nature (or duality) of light.
1. Light particulates
Interaction of light with matter, which is the basis of absorption
and emission spectroscopy, may be best understood in terms of
the “particulate” (corpuscular or discrete) nature of light.
2. Light waves
Light propagation, interference, diffraction, and refraction, are
most easily explained using the “wave” theory.
The wave properties are described in terms of frequency,
wavelength, and amplitude.

Light as electromagnetic wave

• Concept of electromagnetic radiation being waves began in 1862.
• Light is energy carried in form of traveling wave composed of
electric and magnetic fields.
• Electric and magnetic fields vary in intensity and are at right
angles to each other and to direction wave is propagating.
• These fields propagate until energy of wave is converted into
some other form of energy.

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• Electromagnetic radiation in natural world occurs over a wide
range of wavelengths or frequencies.

Velocity of Light - Historical

• Galilee suggested that velocity of light is finite rather than infinite,
but large compared with sound velocities.
• First definite evidence that light moves at a finite velocity found
by Danish astronomer Ole Roemer (1644-1710)
• Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879) showed that:
product of wavelength (it is a distance) and frequency (it is a
reciprocal of time) gives velocity at which the electromagnetic
wave travels
• For any wave
λ * ν = C
wavelength* frequency = speed of propagation
cm * 1/s = cm/s
or
ν = C / λ
frequency = speed of propagation / wavelength
1/s = cm/s / cm
• Hertz is the unit used for measuring frequency for all
electromagnetic radiation (1 Hz = 1 oscillation per second)
• The amount of energy a wave transports is proportional to
square of the wave's amplitude
• The speed of light in vacuum, c, is:
3 x 105 km/s = 3 x 108 m/s = 3 x 1010 cm/s
(exactly 2.9979 x 105 km s-1) in vacuum
Or 186282 mi/s

It takes about 2.5 seconds for a radio communication traveling at the

speed of light to get to the moon and back. Sunrays take 8 minutes
to reach the Earth.
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A light year is the distance about (5.8 trillion miles) light travels in
one year at the speed of 186,282 miles per second.
• This is upper limit for velocity at which energy can be transported
in universe. Speed of light is a fundamental constant of nature
• to obtain light speed in any media, divide light speed in
vacuum by the refractive index of the media.
• Radio, Infrared, Visible, Ultraviolet, X-rays, and γ -rays are all
light. The distinction between them is artificial (since it is only
based on their wavelength).
1 Angstrom, A= 0.10 nm = 10-10 m = 10-8 cm
= 10-7 mm
1m = 1000 mm
1 mm = 1000 µ m
1 cm = 104 µ m
1µ m = 10-4 cm = 103 nm
1 µ m = 1000 millimicron (i.e 1000 nm)
2 µ m (d clay) = 2000 millimicron (i.e 2000 nm)
1 millimicron = 10 A (i.e. 10 nm)
1 µ m = 10-3 mm
1 µ m = 10-4 cm
1 nm = 10-9 m
1m = 109 millimicron (i.e nm)
1 millimicron = 10 A
1m = 1010 A
1 nm = 10 A
1µ m = 1000 millimicron (i.e. 1000 nm)
= 10-6 m
= 104 A = 10-4 cm = 10-3 mm

Electromagnetic Spectrum: (from longer to shorter)

• Radio very long (1 m to 104 m = 10 km)
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• Microwaves long (10-2 to 102 cm) i.e. 0.1 to 1000 mm
• Infrared (10-4 to 10-2 cm) i.e. 1 to 100 microns
• Visible light (about 10-5 cm) i.e. 0.1 micron
average 0.5 µ m (= 5*10-7 m) = 500 nm (= 5*10-5 cm)
from 3500 A (350 nm) (violet) to 7000 A (700 nm) (red)
• Ultraviolet (10-6 to 10-5 cm) i.e. 10 to 100 nm
• X-rays (10-8 to 10-6 cm) i.e. 0.1 to 10 nm
(i.e. 1 to 10 Å)

• Gamma rays (10-10 to 10-8 cm) i.e. 0.001 to 0.1 nm

Visible light Spectrum

400 Violet 500 Blue 600 Green 700 Red (values in nm)

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Paradox of Light Dual Nature

• Max Planck
• “The ultimate origin of the difficulty lies in the fact (or
philosophical principle) that we are compelled to use the words
of common language when we wish to describe a phenomenon,
not by logical or mathematical analysis, but by a picture
appealing to the imagination. Common language has grown by
everyday experience and can never surpass these limits.”
• Laboratory experiments designed to inquire about either
light's wave nature or its corpuscular nature
• No experiment will simultaneously yield discrete and wave
properties of light.
• "We can therefore say that the wave and corpuscular
descriptions are only to be regarded as two complementary
ways of viewing one and the same objective process, a process
which only in definite limiting cases admits complete pictorial
interpretation...."

Particles of Light: Photons, The Discrete Nature of Light

• Max Planck (1858-1947) argued emission of radiant energy by
ideal radiators (blackbodies) is not continuous. Emission is
discontinuous in discrete units, photons. Energy transported by
EM wave is not continuously distributed over wave front defined
by crests. Energy is actually located at discrete points, photons,
along wave-front.
• 1905, Einstein used this idea of Max Planck (discrete nature for
emission of light) to explain a phenomenon discovered in 1887
known as photoelectric effect.(for which he obtined Nobel
prize, not for the relativity!).

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• Light particles are called photons (discrete "packets" of energy
that move with velocity of light in straight lines, they are massless
and electrically neutral)

• Mathematical solution of the paradox

• Wavelength characterizes wavelike properties of light whereas
energy content refers to its discrete nature. The fact that
wavelength and energy content can be linked in mathematical
equation (E photon = h c / λ ) is the strongest argument for
duality--simultaneously wave and photon.
In fact, each photon carries a discrete amount of energy E that
depends upon its wavelength λ (de Broglie equation):
hC
E = hν =
λ

E(photon) = (constant) / (wavelength).

h Planck's constant (6.626196 * 10-34 Joule-second).
ν frequency (constant for a given monocromatic light).
C speed of light.
λ wavelength.
Remember that we have earlier shown Maxwell relationship:

ν = C / λ
• This mean that energy content in photon is inversely proportional
to its wavelength, i.e., short wavelength light (e.g. X-rays and
γ-rays) carries much more energy (per photon) than light that
has a long wavelength (e.g. radio or infrared light).
This equation ties together the particle and wave nature of light
permitting us to convert (back and forth) from wavelengths to
photons and photons to their corresponding wavelengths.
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Photons Interaction With Matter

• Radiating body emits photons of differing discrete amounts of

energy in all directions.
• Photons are created inside atoms of radiating body from which
they receive their energy content.
• Photon energy content remains constant while traveling
through space.
• Photons may be absorbed (by atoms) when they encounter
matter; they lose their identity by transferring their energy to
atoms.
• Creation and destruction of photons by atoms is a classic
example of conservation of energy (i.e. the first law of
thermodynamics).

• Microwave radiation - when absorbed - stimulates

rotational motion of molecules.
• Infrared radiation - when absorbed - stimulates
vibrational motion of molecules.
• Visible and UV radiation - when absorbed - cause
electrons to be promoted to higher energy orbital.
• X-rays and short wavelength UV radiation - when
absorbed - break chemical bonds and cause ionization
damage to living organisms.

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SPECTROSCOPY
8.2 light absorption
8.2.1 Beer’s law
8.2.2 Lambert law
8.3 light measurements (photometry)
8.3.1 Colorimetry
8.3.2 Spectroscopy
Spectroscopy is the use of the absorption, emission, or scattering of
electromagnetic radiation by atoms or molecules (or atomic or
molecular ions) to qualitatively, or quantitatively study the atoms or
molecules, or to study physical processes.

Spectroscopy deals with the production, measurement, and

interpretation of spectra arising from the interaction of
electromagnetic radiation with matter.

Methods differ in

1. Species to be analyzed (such as molecular or atomic spectroscopy)

2. Type of radiation-matter interaction to be monitored (such as
absorption, emission, or diffraction)
3. Region of the electromagnetic spectrum used in the analysis.

Spectroscopic methods are based on the absorption or emission of

radiation in the ultraviolet (UV), visible (VIS), infrared (IR), and
radio (nuclear magnetic resonance, NMR).

Spectrophotometry is any procedure that uses light to measure

chemical concentrations.

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Spectrophotometery and the Absorption of Light

Analytical chemists frequently use the measurement of light

absorption to determine concentration of chemicals. The technique is
called spectrophotometry or spectroscopy.

Why is light absorbed?

Light is energy, and when energy is absorbed by a chemical, it
results in a change in energy levels of the chemical.

Molecules normally exist in discrete energy levels.

- Vibrational energy levels exist because molecular bonds
vibrate at specific frequencies.
- Electronic energy levels exist because electrons in
molecules can be excited to discrete, higher energy orbital.

A molecule will absorb energy (light) when the light energy (or
wavelength) exactly matches the energy difference between the two
energy states of the molecule.

For example, a carbon-hydrogen chemical bond (C-H) vibrates at

frequency υ 1 and a higher frequency υ 2.

Light energy is absorbed by the C-H chemical bond at a specific

wavelength of light when the bond energy difference between υ 1
and υ 2 equals the energy of the light.
E=hυ =hC/λ
E = h (υ 1 - υ 2)
where υ = frequency of light, λ = wavelength of light, h = Planck's
constant, and C = speed of light.

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Infrared light contains enough energy to cause changes in vibrational
energy levels, and this forms the basis of Infrared Spectroscopy.

UV and visible light contains enough energy to excite electrons in

molecules, and forms the basis for UV-VIS Spectroscopy.

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