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Transverse waves are contrasted with longitudinal waves, where the oscillations occur in the direction of the wave. The standard example of a longitudinal wave is a sound wave or "pressure wave" in gases, liquids, or solids, whose oscillations cause compression and expansion of the material through which the wave is propagating. Pressure waves ...
"Longitudinal waves" and "transverse waves" have been abbreviated by some authors as "L-waves" and "T-waves", respectively, for their own convenience. [1] While these two abbreviations have specific meanings in seismology (L-wave for Love wave [2] or long wave [3]) and electrocardiography (see T wave), some authors chose to use "ℓ-waves" (lowercase 'L') and "t-waves" instead, although they ...
Mechanical waves can be produced only in media which possess elasticity and inertia. There are three types of mechanical waves: transverse waves, longitudinal waves, and surface waves. Some of the most common examples of mechanical waves are water waves, sound waves, and seismic waves. Like all waves, mechanical waves transport energy.
In a transverse wave, the atoms vibrate perpendicular to the wave propagation. However, except for isotropic crystals, waves in a crystal are not exactly longitudinal or transverse. For general anisotropic crystals, the phonon waves are longitudinal or transverse only in certain special symmetry directions.
Both transverse and longitudinal waves may have longitudinal modes when confined to a cavity. The analysis of longitudinal modes is especially important in lasers with single transversal mode, for example, in single-mode fiber lasers. The number of longitudinal modes of such a laser can be estimated as ratio of the spectral width of gain to the ...
A wave can be longitudinal where the oscillations are parallel (or antiparallel) to the propagation direction, or transverse where the oscillations are perpendicular to the propagation direction. These oscillations are characterized by a periodically time-varying displacement in the parallel or perpendicular direction, and so the instantaneous ...
Linearly polarized waves consist of photons that are in a superposition of right and left circularly polarized states, with equal amplitude and phases synchronized to give oscillation in a plane. [8] Polarization is an important parameter in areas of science dealing with transverse waves, such as optics, seismology, radio, and microwaves.
Ripples on the surface of a pond are actually a combination of transverse and longitudinal waves; therefore, the points on the surface follow orbital paths. Sound, a mechanical wave that propagates through gases, liquids, solids and plasmas. Inertial waves, which occur in rotating fluids and are restored by the Coriolis effect.