Consumer Electronics

SUPERPOSITION OF WAVES

When two or more waves exist simultaneously in the same medium, each wave travels through the medium ignoring the presence of the other wave. In the sense of propagation through the medium neither wave affects the other. However, at a point where two waves of the same kind reach simultaneously, the medium will have a displacement that is the sum of the displacements of the individual waves. Here displacement refers to the departure from normal to that property of the medium which varies as the wave passes through the medium. If the property is a complex quantity, the sum is a vector sum. Let ɸ₁ and ɸ₂ represent the displacements of the individual waves. Then at every point in the medium and at each instant of time the resultant ...