3D Laboratory // Experiment No. 02

The pattern of interference

Two stones falling into the same pond. Where the waves meet, the water decides: double up or cancel out. Drag the sources and draw the pattern yourself.

Calibrando instrumentos…

Field notes // Observations

What are you looking at?

OBS/01ψ = ψ₁ + ψ₂

Waves add up

Superposition principle: when two waves cross, the surface responds to the sum of both. Turn off the 2nd source and you see perfect circles; turn it on and the pattern is born.

OBS/02Δr = nλ

Constructive interference

Where the path difference is a whole number of wavelengths, crest meets crest: the wave doubles. These are the bright rays fanning out from the axis between the sources.

OBS/03Δr = (n+½)λ

The dead lines

Where a crest meets a trough, the water never moves: nodal lines. This very pattern, made with light, is the double-slit experiment that revealed the wave nature of matter.