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A metallic sheet has a large number of slits, 5.0 mm wide and 16 cm apart, and i

ID: 2306630 • Letter: A

Question

A metallic sheet has a large number of slits, 5.0 mm wide and 16 cm apart, and is used as a diffraction grating for microwaves. A wide parallel beam of microwaves is incident normally on the sheet. What is the smallest microwave frequency for which only the central maximum occurs? (The speed of these EM waves is c = 3.00 × 108 m/s.) A metallic sheet has a large number of slits, 5.0 mm wide and 16 cm apart, and is used as a diffraction grating for microwaves. A wide parallel beam of microwaves is incident normally on the sheet. What is the smallest microwave frequency for which only the central maximum occurs? (The speed of these EM waves is c = 3.00 × 108 m/s.) A metallic sheet has a large number of slits, 5.0 mm wide and 16 cm apart, and is used as a diffraction grating for microwaves. A wide parallel beam of microwaves is incident normally on the sheet. What is the smallest microwave frequency for which only the central maximum occurs? (The speed of these EM waves is c = 3.00 × 108 m/s.)

Explanation / Answer

For constructive interference to occur

dSin = m, where d is the separation between the openings and m is any integer

for central maxima =0

d = = 14.5 cm, the separation between the from the successive opening is 14 cm +5mm 1

smallest frequency of the waves f = 3x108 /14.5 = 20.69 GHz