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8.03SC Physics III: Vibrations and Waves

8.03SC Physics III: Vibrations and Waves (Fall 2016, MIT OCW). Instructor: Professor Yen-Jie Lee. Vibrations and waves are everywhere. If you take any system and disturb it from a stable equilibrium, the resultant motion will be waves and vibrations. Think of a guitar string - pluck the string, and it vibrates. The sound waves generated make their way to our ears, and we hear the string's sound. Our eyes see what's happening because they receive the electromagnetic waves of the light reflected from the guitar string, so that we can recognize the beautiful sinusoidal waves on the string. In fact, without vibrations and waves, we could not recognize the universe around us at all!

The amazing thing is that we can describe many fascinating phenomena arising from very different physical systems with mathematics. This course will provide you with the concepts and mathematical tools necessary to understand and explain a broad range of vibrations and waves. You will learn that waves come from many interconnected (coupled) objects when they are vibrating together. We will discuss many of these phenomena, along with related topics, including mechanical vibrations and waves, sound waves, electromagnetic waves, optics, and gravitational waves. (from ocw.mit.edu)

Lecture 05 - Beat Phenomena

Prof. Wyslouch shows the solution of two coupled pendula. A very interesting result from the calculation is that beat phenomena could be identified in the motion of the pendula, similar to what one could feel with sound waves.


References
Lecture 5 - Beat Phenomena
Topics: Coupled Oscillators. Beat Phenomena. Normal Axis. Lecture Notes. Textbook Reading. Problem Set.

Go to the Course Home or watch other lectures:

Part I: Mechanical Vibrations and Waves
Lecture 01 - Periodic Oscillators, Harmonic Oscillators
Lecture 02 - Damped Free Oscillators
Lecture 03 - Driven Oscillators, Transient Phenomena, Resonance
Lecture 04 - Coupled Oscillators, Normal Modes
Lecture 05 - Beat Phenomena
Lecture 06 - Driven Oscillators, Resonance
Lecture 07 - Symmetry, Infinite Number of Coupled Oscillators
Lecture 08 - Translation Symmetry
Lecture 09 - Wave Equation, Standing Waves, Fourier Series
Lecture 10 - Traveling Waves
Lecture 11 - Sound Waves
Part II: Electromagnetic Waves
Lecture 12 - Maxwell's Equation, Electromagnetic Waves
Lecture 13 - Dispersive Medium, Phase Velocity, Group Velocity
Lecture 14 - Fourier Transform, AM Radio
Lecture 15 - Uncertainty Principle, 2D Waves
Lecture 16 - 2D and 3D Waves, Snell's Law
Part III: Optics
Lecture 17 - Polarization, Polarizer
Lecture 18 - Wave Plates, Radiation
Lecture 19 - Waves in Medium
Lecture 20 - Interference, Soap Bubble
Lecture 21 - Phased Radar, Single Electron Interference
Lecture 22 - Diffraction, Resolution
Lecture 23 - Quantum Waves and Gravitational Waves
Lecture 24 - Review for Final Example