Single Slit

Diffraction

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 Certificate
This is to inform you that Piyush Aneja of class XII-A, Sri
Guru Nanak Public School, Delhi has successfully
completed his project in Physics ‘Single Slit Diffraction’ as
prescribed by CBSE in year 2024-2025.
Board Roll No. :

_________________ ___________________
Signature of internal Signature of Examiner
Examiner

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 Acknowledgement
I whole-heartedly pay gratitude to my Physics teacher
Mrs. Deepika Kurar Kataria for her constant support in
successful completion of this project.

I am thankful to my school principal Mrs. Shikha Gupta for

providing me the resources to execute this project and my
parents for motivating me during the course of the project.
At last, I would like to thanks CBSE for providing me the
great opportunity to develop this project.

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 Index
S.No. CONTENTS PAGE NO.
1. Certificate 2
2. Acknowledgement 3
3. Diffraction 5
4. Observing Diffraction in Everyday Life 6
5. Applications of Diffraction 8
6. Theory 10
7. A Summary of Key Features of 12
Rectangular-Slit Diffraction Pattern
8. Experiment 13
9. Aim 14
10. Apparatus Required 15
11. Procedure 16
12. Observation 17
13. Diffraction Pattern 18
14. Calculation 20
15. Result 21
16. Bibliography 22

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 Diffraction
Diffraction is the phenomenon of bending of waves around
the obstacles. Any type of energy that travel in a wave is
capable of diffraction and diffraction of sound and light
waves produce a number of effects. The amount of bending
depends on the relative size of the opening. If the opening is
much larger than the light's wavelength, the bending will be
almost unnoticeable. However, if the two are closer in size or
equal, the amount of bending is considerable and easily seen
with naked eyes.

Diffraction of sound waves is observed commonly. We notice

sound diffracting around corners or through door openings,
allowing us to hear others who are speaking to us from
adjacent rooms. Many forest-dwelling birds take advantage
of the diffractive ability of long wavelength sound wave.

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 Observing Diffraction
Pattern in Everyday Life
Due to the much wider range of areas in which
scientists, diffraction of light, have applied light diffraction
and not sound will be the principal topic for the remainder
of this essay. We have already seen that wavelength has an
important role in diffraction, so does the size of aperture
relative to the wavelength.

Hence, most studies of diffraction in light involve very

small opening as, for instance, in the diffraction grating
discussed below.

However, light does not diffract when passing through

an aperture, such the concert hall door; it also diffracts
around obstacles, as, for instance, the post or pillar
mentioned earlier. This can be observed looking closely at
the shadow of flagpole on bright morning.

At first, it appears that the shadow is "solid", but if one

looks closely enough, it become clear that, at the edges,
there is a blurring from the darkness to light. This grey area"
is an example of light diffraction.

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 Where the aperture or obstruction is large compared to
the wave passing through or around it, there is only little
"fuzziness" at the edge, as in the case of the flagpole. When
light passes through an aperture, most of the beam goes
straight without disturbance, with only the edges
experiencing diffraction. If diffraction pattern will widen.
Sound waves diffract at large angles through an open door.
which, as noted, is comparable in size to a sound wave;
similarly. when tis passed through extremely narrow
openings, its diffraction is more noticeable.

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Applications of Diffraction
X-Ray Diffraction
Because they are very higher frequency and energy
levels, x ray is even shorter in wavelength than visible light
waves.
Hence, for x-ray diffraction, it is necessary to have
grating in which lines are separated by infinitesimal
distances. These distances are measured in 'angstrom', of
which there are 10 million to a millimetre. Angstroms are
used in an x-ray diffraction grating are comparable to the
size of atom.
When x-ray irradiate crystals, when the crystals absorb
Radiation in the form of x-ray, atoms in the crystals diffract
the rays. One of the characteristics of a crystals is that its
atom are equally spaced and because of this, it is possible to
discover the location and distance between atoms b dying x-
ray diffraction pattern. Bragg's law named after the father
and son team of English Physicist William Henry Bragg
(1862- 1942) and William Lawrence Bragg (1890-1971) who
analysed x-ray diffraction patterns to determine crystal
structures, were awarded the Noble Prize in physics in 1915
for their work.
Though much about x-ray diffraction and
crystallography seems rather abstract, its application in
areas such as DNA.
Research indicates that it has numerous applications
for improving human life. The elder Bragg expressed the
fact in 1915, saying, "we are now able to look ten thousand

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times deeper into the structure of matter that makes up our
universe than when we had to depend on microscope alone.
Today Physicist use diffractometer, which helps them to
compare diffraction patterns.

Hologram
Holograms: A word derived from the Greek Holos
"whole" and gram, "message" is a (3-D) impression of an
object and the method of producing these images is known
as holography. Holograms make use of laser beam that mix
at an angle, producing an interference pattern of alternating
bright and dark lines. The surface of hologram is itself
grating, with alternating strips of clear and opaque material.
By mixing a laser beam and the unfocussed diffraction
patterns of an object, an image can be recorded.
Holograms are not to confuse with ordinary 3-D images
that use only visible light. The latter are produced by a
method known as stereoscopy, which creates a single image
from two, superimposing the images to create the impression
of a picture with a depth. Though stereoscopic it seems as
though one can step into" the picture.
A hologram actually enables the viewer to glimpse the
image from any angle. Thus, stereoscopic images can be
compared to looking through the plate glass window of a
store display, whereas hologram conveys the sensation that
one has actually stepped into the store window itself.

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 Theory
When coherent light of monochromatic wavelength is
incident upon a slit, the light diverges as it passes through
a slit in a process known as Diffraction. A laser produces
coherent light, which means all the light striking the slit is
in a phase. If the light then falls on the screen placed at the
large distance, from the slit it produces the pattern of
alternating bright and dark images of the slit. This pattern
is referred to as a Fraunhofer Diffraction Pattern, which is
the simplest case of diffraction. It occurs when ray emerging
from the slit can be considered parallel.

The diffraction process is explained by the fact that light

is a form of electromagnetic wave and the different portion
of the slit we have as if they were separate source of light
waves Huygens principle. At each point on the screen, the
light from the different path length of the light from each
portion of the slit to the point on the screen. Light from the
different portion of the slit will interfere each other and the
resultant intensity will vary at different places on the screen.

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 Consider wave 1 from near the bottom of the slit and
wave 3 from the centre of the slit. They differ in the path
length by amount (a.sinθ)/2. If this path difference is exactly
equal to half a wavelength λ/ 2 the two waves will be 180°
out of phase and will interfere destructively and cancel each
other.

Therefore, waves from the upper half of the slit will be

180° out of phase with the waves from lower half
of the slit when

𝑎 𝜆
sin 𝜃 =
2 2
By dividing slits into 2n portions, it can be shown that
the condition for destructive interference will be satisfied at
angles on the screen above and below the centre of the
pattern given by

𝑛𝜆
sin 𝜃 = 𝑛 = ±1, ±2, ±3 …
2
There is no simple expression for the location of maxima
on the screen other than that of the principle maximum at
centre of the pattern. The other maxima are much less
intense than the principal maximum and are located
approximately halfway between the minima.

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 A Summary of the Key Features of
this Rectangular-Slit Diffraction Pattern

Minima

The minima occur at the angle given by a=sinθ/λ and

are called first, second, third, fourth... minima respectively.
It is to be noted that the condition for minima is same as
obtained previously.

Principal Maxima

The central peak, bracketed by the two 'First minima'

(which are located at a=sinθ/λ = ±1) is the region of highest
light intensity and the most of the diffracted waves' energy
is concentrated in this region.

Secondary Maxima

A detailed analysis of equation (which involves taking

derivative to find the maxima of this expression) reveals that
the secondary occurs at the angles given by

α sinθ
= = ±1.43030, ±2.45902, ±3.47089
𝜆

These are first, second and third secondary maxima.

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 EXPERIMENT

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 Aim of project
To calculate the wavelength of a monochromatic source of
light (by red and green laser light) diffraction through a
single slit

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 Apparatus
Required
SNO. APPARATUS
1. Travelling Microscope
2. Green Laser
3. Slit
4. Clamp Stand
5. Dark Room
6. White screen
7. Meter Scale

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 Procedure
1. Keep the slit to the filament, in front of eyes. With
slight adjustment of the width of the slit and the
parallelism of the edges, the pattern should be seen
with its dark and bright bands.
2. Mark the position centre of all the observable dark
fringes.
3. Mark the position of the fringe on the left or right of
the central point between the fringes.
4. Measure the fringe width with the help of travelling
microscope with a least count of 0.01 mm or mark 2
to 4 such a pair of point to get observation for width
of images of the slit and find their mean.
5. Measure the width of the slit using travelling
microscope.
6. Calculate the wavelength by the formula.

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 Observation
1. Least count of travelling microscope:
2. Least count of meter scale:
3. Distance of the slit from the screen (D):
4. Wavelength of green laser:
5. Width of slit:
6. Width of central maxima:

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 Diffraction Pattern

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 Calculation .
To calculate the wavelength of green laser:

2𝜆𝐷
𝛽=
𝑑

𝜆=

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Percentage Error

Result
1) The wavelength of
green laser is:

With a percentage error:

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 Bibliography
1. www.wikipedia.org
2. XII – Physics NCERT

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