Fizeau experiment

The Fizeau experiment was carried out by Hippolyte Fizeau in the 1851 to measure the relative speeds of light in moving water. Albert Einstein later pointed out the importance of the experiment for special relativity.

The experiment

Fizeau's test was designed to evaluate the prediction by Augustin Fresnel that a moving dispersive medium should create a partial offset in the speed of any light moving through it, because the refractive index, n, would be dependent on the density of the luminiferous aether, so the Fresnel drag coefficient is :$1\; -\; frac\{1\}\{n^2\}$. The velocity of light in a moving medium is therefore::$V\; =\; frac\; \{c\}\{n\}\; +\; v\; left(1\; -\; frac\{1\}\{n^2\}\; ight)$

This was confirmed by Fizeau's experiment in 1851. The experiment sent two beams of light through a pair of tubes filled with flowing water, so that one beam was always travelling in the same direction as the flowing water, and the other was travelling against the flow. The timelag between the two beams was then measured with an interferometer.

It was shown by Hendrik Lorentz (1892, 1895) that the experiment can be explained by the reaction of the moving water upon the interfering waves without the need of any aether entrainment. On this occasion, Lorentz introduced a different time coordinate for moving bodies within the aether, the so called Local time (an early form of the Lorentz transformation for small velocities compared to the speed of light). Based on the complete Lorentz transformation, Albert Einstein in 1905 derived the "velocity addition formula" of special relativity. Subsequently, it was shown by Jakob Laub and Max von Laue (1907) that the Fresnel drag coefficient can easily explained by that formula and therefore the experiment is supporting evidence for the velocity addition characteristics of special relativity. Einstein later emphasized the importance of the experiment for developing and confirming the theory.

Although it is referred to as "the" Fizeau experiment, Fizeau was an active experimenter who carried out a wide variety of different experiments involving measuring the speed of light in different situations.

Fizeau's result was replicated by Albert Michelson and Edward Morley (1886), and by Pieter Zeeman (1914).

ee also

* History of special relativity

References

*Cite journal
author=Fizeau, H.
title=Sur les hypothèses relatives à l’éther lumineux
journal=Comptes Rendus
volume=33
year=1851
pages=349–355
url=http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k29901/f351.chemindefer

*Cite journal
author=Fizeau, H.
title=Sur les hypothèses relatives à l’éther lumineux
journal=Ann. de Chim. et de Phys.
volume=57
year=1859
pages=385-404
url=http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k347981/f381.table

*Cite journal
author=Michelson, A. A. and Morley, E.W.
title=Influence of motion of the medium on the motion of light
journal=Am. J. Science
volume=31
year=1886
pages=377-386

*Cite journal
last=Laue, M.
year=1907
title= Die Mitführung des Lichtes durch bewegte Körper nach dem Relativitätsprinzip
journal=Annalen der Physik
volume =23
pages =989-990
url=http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k153304/f993.chemindefer

*Cite journal
author=Zeeman, Pieter
title=Fresnel's coefficient for light of different colours. (First part)
journal=Proc. Kon. Acad. van Weten.
volume=17
year=1914
pages=445-451
url=http://www.digitallibrary.nl/proceedings/search/detail.cfm?pubid=1708&view=image&startrow=1

*Cite journal
author=Zeeman, Pieter
title=Fresnel's coefficient for light of different colours. (Second part)
journal=Proc. Kon. Acad. van Weten.
volume=18
year=1915
pages=398-408
url=http://www.digitallibrary.nl/proceedings/search/detail.cfm?pubid=1847&view=image&startrow=1

*Cite book
last=Miller, A.I.
year=1981
title= Albert Einstein’s special theory of relativity. Emergence (1905) and early interpretation (1905–1911)
location= Reading
publisher=Addison–Wesley
isbn=0-201-04679-2

ee also

* aether drag hypothesis
* velocity-addition formula
* Michelson-Morley experiment