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Transverse waves are contrasted with longitudinal waves, where the oscillations occur in the direction of the wave. The standard example of a longitudinal wave is a sound wave or "pressure wave" in gases, liquids, or solids, whose oscillations cause compression and expansion of the material through which the wave is propagating.
A transverse mode of electromagnetic radiation is a particular electromagnetic field pattern of the radiation in the plane perpendicular (i.e., transverse) to the radiation's propagation direction. Transverse modes occur in radio waves and microwaves confined to a waveguide, and also in light waves in an optical fiber and in a laser's optical ...
Electromagnetic waves (such as light), traveling in free space or another homogeneous isotropic non-attenuating medium, are properly described as transverse waves, meaning that a plane wave's electric field vector E and magnetic field H are each in some direction perpendicular to (or "transverse" to) the direction of wave propagation; E and H ...
In homogeneous, isotropic media, the oscillations of the two fields are on average perpendicular to each other and perpendicular to the direction of energy and wave propagation, forming a transverse wave. Electromagnetic radiation is commonly referred to as "light", EM, EMR, or electromagnetic waves. [2]
In part correct, [2] being able to successfully explain refraction, reflection, rectilinear propagation and to a lesser extent diffraction, the theory would fall out of favor in the early nineteenth century, as the wave theory of light amassed new experimental evidence. [3] The modern understanding of light is the concept of wave-particle duality.
In 1816 André-Marie Ampère gave Augustin-Jean Fresnel an idea that the polarization of light can be explained by the wave theory if light were a transverse wave. [37] Later, Fresnel independently worked out his own wave theory of light and presented it to the Académie des Sciences in 1817.
In 1821, Augustin-Jean Fresnel announced his hypothesis that light waves are exclusively transverse and therefore always polarized in the sense of having a particular transverse orientation, and that what we call unpolarized light is in fact light whose orientation is rapidly and randomly changing.
The phenomenon of polarization arises as a consequence of the fact that light behaves as a two-dimensional transverse wave. Circular polarization occurs when the two orthogonal electric field component vectors are of equal magnitude and are out of phase by exactly 90°, or one-quarter wavelength.