Tag: laws of reflection

Newton used corpuscular theory to explain reflection and refraction of light. According to Sir Isaac Newton's Corpuscular Theory a luminous body continuously emits tiny, light and elastic particles called corpuscles in all directions. When these particles fall on the retina of the eye, they produce the sensation of vision.

Normal is perpendicular drawn to the surface at the point of incidence so that angle between incident ray and normal is angle of incidence.

Normal is the line drawn perpendicular to the surface of the mirror at the point of incidence. 

Light moving in one medium when falls at the surface of another medium, part of light returns to the same medium. Some part is transmitted and the rest is absorbed.  No material is a perfect reflector. Almost all surfaces absorb some part of light.

The ray of light which gets reflected from a polished surface is called reflected ray of light.

The ray of light which emerges after bouncing off the surface of a mirror is reflected ray.

According to definition, when a beam of light appears to meet at a point, after reflection, from a mirror then the image formed is known as virtual image. It cannot be obtained on a screen.

According to definition, the perpendicular drawn to the surface of the mirror at the point of incidence is known as normal ray.

Plane mirror shows lateral inversion. Left appears right and right appears left.

When a mirror forms an image, the left and right sides of the image are interchanged. This phenomenon is called lateral inversion as the image is laterally inverted.