PHYS3153 O2 Applications of Interferometry

Name: Wu Tsz Chun (20195100) Session: LA3

1. Introduction
Interferometers play an important role in both the research and engineering since they hint the
information contained in the phase factor of wave, which in turn can be used measuring physical
quantities such as fine displacement and refractive index. Apart from industrial purposes,
interferometers are used in many frontier physics researches. For example, the absence of Ether
was proved by using a huge interferometer by Michelson in 1881. Recently, this technique is
applied for discovering gravitational waves which is a promising discovery for the next Nobel
Prize in physics. Understanding interferometry is therefore crucial for engaging in further
experimental studies of optics.

In this experiment, we aim at exploring the principle of interferometers. In the first part of the
experiment, wavelength of the laser beam will be measured from the interference pattern of the
Michaelson Interferometer. In the second part, similar techniques will be applied to determine the
refractive index of air. Finally, the Fabry-Perot Interferometer will be studied by using HeNe laser
and tungsten lamp as light source.

The rest of the summary is structured as follows. Section 2 presents the theory for transistors and
op amp, Section 3 presents the experimental results and discussion, and conclusion will be
included finally in Section 4.

2. Theory and experimental setup

Due to the wave nature of light, interference patterns can be obtained when two coherent light
waves superimpose each other. The bright fringes are governed by the path difference in the
experimental setup. Mathematically, this can be expressed as

= (1)

where , and are respectively the path difference, order of bright fringe and wavelength of the
light source.

2.1. The Michaelson Interferometer

In this experiment, we shall examine how is the path difference affect interference pattern with the
Michaelson Interferometer. The experimental setup is demonstrated in Fig. 1 of the lab notebook.
The laser beam passes the convex lens with 18 mm focal length and is then split by the beam
splitter. Through tuning the movable mirror, the path travelled by one of the light beam can be
adjusted. Since one of the light beam will travel the two times the path between the movable mirror
and the beam-splitter, tuning the mirror a distance /4 towards the splitter would reduce to optical
path of that beam by /2. The interference pattern will change according. The original maxima of
the ring will become smaller and occupy the position of the original minima. The process repeats
until the maxima and minima interchange position again and the whole pattern is then
indistinguishable from the original one.

Experimentally, the beam splitting is tuned to around 45 such that the light split can be reflected
successfully to the screen. Then, we tune the tilting angle of the fixed mirror such that the two light
spots overlap each other on the screen. A convex lens is then introduced before the light splitter
such that the interference pattern can be seen.

By using this principle, we can determine the wavelength of light. First, we slowly adjust the
movable mirror with a known distance . Then, we count the number N of times that the
interference pattern returns to its original state. The wavelength can then be calculated as

2
= (2)

2.2.Measurement of the Index of Refraction of Air.

By using the setup in Section 2.1 with minor amendment, the index of refraction of air can be
determined.

Denote the order of fringe at , = 0 and , > 0 respectively by 0 and and the
length of the chamber by . The difference of refractive index can be found by exploring the order
of fringe with Eq. (1). The difference of refractive index can be calculated by

2 2 2
= 0 = = ( )
0 0 (3)

We shall explore the dependence of and , in our experiment. If they are linearly
dependent, then one can write

= 0 + (4)

where is some proportional constant and p is the pressure inside the chamber. It follows that
= 0 = = , since = , . Combined with Eq. (2), we have

= , =
2 2,

= 0 +
2, (5)

2.3. The Fabry-Perot Interferometer

The experimental setup for the Fabry-Perot interferometer is shown in Fig. 3. Two partially
transparent mirrors are aligned in parallel and a reflective cavity and thus formed. The phase
difference between the light beam depends on the distance between the two mirrors. Similar to that
of Michaelson interferometer, interference rings will be formed because of the phase difference.
One can measure the dependence of fringe order and path difference to determine the wavelength
of light with Eq. (2). To explore the coherence length, we change the separation D between the
movable mirror and the fixed mirror. One can expect when going D going too large, the split light
beams are no longer coherent because of their limited coherence length. As a result, we will look
for a distance D at which the interference pattern disappears. Finally, we switch to a tungsten light
source and explore the difference of the resulting interference pattern and its coherence length.

3. Results and Discussion

3.1 The Michaelson Interferometer

As discussed in Section 2.1, the order of fringe N is measured when for different displacement of
the movable mirror 2 as shown in P.5 of the notebook. We plot the 2 as a function of and
found that the slope is 620 30 . According to Eq. (2), the slope of such plot represents the
wavelength of the laser beam and thus we conclude that the wavelength = 620 30 .
Compared to expected value 632.8 nm, our measurement is just 2 % different from it, indicating
the accuracy of such measurement.

3.2 Measurement of the Index of Refraction of Air.

Following the analysis in Section 2.2, we measure the how the order of fringe N varies with the
pressure , as shown in Table 1 of the notebook. With the help of Eq. (3), the change in
refractive index can be plotted against , as demonstrated in Fig. 7, which shows a clear
linear dependence. From the slope, we found that 2/ = 0.43, which in turns determine
in Eq. (4) to be (3.60 0.04) 106 ( )1 by assuming = 632.8 and =
38 . Under room condition, the refractive index of air can be found by Eq. (5) to be 1.000274
5 106 . Our result is in excellent agreement with the literature value 1.000277.

3.3 The Fabry-Perot Interferometer

We investigate the interference pattern produced by the Fabry-Perot Interferometer to calculate

the wavelength of the laser source again. Similar to the measurement before, we measure how the
path difference 2 depends on the order of fringe . Using the same technique illustrated in
Section 3.1, we plot 2 against as depicted in Fig. 6 and found that wavelength = 580
40 , which agree with the value determined in Section 3.1 when uncertainty is included.
Compared to the expected value of 632.8 nm, our result is 8 % away from it, which is acceptable
due to experimental error such as wrong counting of the fringe order . Next, we investigate the
coherence length of the light source. By moving the fixed mirror to tune the separation D up to
1.10 m, the interference pattern disappears, indicating that laser beams split start to become
incoherent. Thus, the coherence length of the laser is around 1.10 m. Finally, the light source is
switched to a tungsten lamp from HeNe laser. The resulting interference pattern consists a color
spectrum and width of the fringes are larger than that of HeNe laser. Upon increasing the separation
D by the order of a few , the interference pattern disappears, indicating that the coherence
length of the tungsten light source is very small. The first possible reason is that a spectrum of
light instead a single wavelength of light is emitted by the tungsten source, the fact the light with
different wavelength has different frequency suggests the difficulties in having coherent beams.
The second reason is that the tungsten lamp is not a point source, resulting in a spread of light
which contribute to the incoherence among them.

4 Conclusion

In this experiment, we investigated two common interferometers, namely the Michaelson and the
Fabry-Perot interferometer. In the first part of the experiment, we determined the wavelength of
the laser source from the dependence of path difference and the order of fringe. In the second part
of the experiment, index of refraction of air is derived with a similar setup. By studying the relation
between the pressure and the change in refractive index, we determine the refractive index to be
very close to the theoretical result. Finally, we study the properties of Fabry-Perot interferometer.
The wavelength and the coherence length of the laser source are determined from the resulting
interference pattern. The result contrasts with that of a tungsten light source, which generates a
color band of wider fringes instead of a monochromatic one and has a coherence length of order
. Overall, the setup and properties of the interferometers are made more clear through the
experiment.

5 References
[1] P. Tong, H.B. Chan, K.L. Leung and D. Mak, PHYS 3153 Methods of Experimental Physics II
Laboratory Manual, Department of Physics, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.
(2015).