Physics 212 Lab Assignment 2 Fall 2008
______________________________________________________________________________
Due at the beginning of lab, September 24 or 25.
Reading:
Taylor: Chapter 4. Note that section 4.4 and 4.6 introduce important ideas that
may not be familiar to you.
Problems:
3.2 – a simple example of radioactive decay and statistics for random events
3.14 – a nice practical problem
3.22 – think about how the error in part b is related to that in part a.
3.34 a and b – example of step by step propagation
Diffraction grating problem:
Increasing the size of the telescope’s aperture increases the intensity striking your
eye but also increases the width of the acceptance angle (uncertainty in θ). If the
grating has a spacing of 3 μm with negligible uncertainty and you measure an
angle of 12.0° ± 0.1°, what is the wavelength of the light and its uncertainty?
(Don’t forget to put Δθ in radians.)
diffraction
g
ratin
g
telesco
p
e