refrációs

Refraction is the bending of a wave as it passes from one medium to another. This phenomenon occurs because the speed of the wave changes as it enters a different medium. Light, sound, and other types of waves can be refracted. The amount of bending depends on the angle at which the wave strikes the boundary between the two media and the refractive indices of the media. The refractive index of a medium is a measure of how much the speed of light is reduced in that medium compared to its speed in a vacuum.

When light travels from a less dense medium (like air) to a denser medium (like water or glass), it bends towards the normal, which is an imaginary line perpendicular to the surface at the point of incidence. Conversely, when light travels from a denser medium to a less dense medium, it bends away from the normal. This principle is described by Snell's Law, which relates the angles of incidence and refraction to the refractive indices of the two media.

Refraction is responsible for many everyday optical phenomena. For instance, it causes a straight object, like a straw, to appear bent when partially submerged in water. It is also the principle behind the operation of lenses, which are used in eyeglasses, cameras, telescopes, and microscopes to focus light and form images. The dispersion of light into its constituent colors by a prism is another example of refraction, where different wavelengths of light are refracted at slightly different angles due to variations in the refractive index with wavelength.