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Wave numbers and wave vectors play an essential role in optics and the physics of wave scattering, such as X-ray diffraction, neutron diffraction, electron diffraction, and elementary particle physics. For quantum mechanical waves, the wavenumber multiplied by the reduced Planck constant is the canonical momentum.
The wave equation is a second-order linear partial differential equation for the description of waves or standing wave fields such as mechanical waves (e.g. water waves, sound waves and seismic waves) or electromagnetic waves (including light waves). It arises in fields like acoustics, electromagnetism, and fluid dynamics.
Intensity is used most frequently with waves such as acoustic waves , matter waves such as electrons in electron microscopes, and electromagnetic waves such as light or radio waves, in which case the average power transfer over one period of the wave is used. Intensity can be applied to other circumstances where energy is transferred.
The group velocity is the rate at which the wave envelope, i.e. the changes in amplitude, propagates. The wave envelope is the profile of the wave amplitudes; all transverse displacements are bound by the envelope profile.
In engineering, attenuation is usually measured in units of decibels per unit length of medium (dB/cm, dB/km, etc.) and is represented by the attenuation coefficient of the medium in question. [1] Attenuation also occurs in earthquakes; when the seismic waves move farther away from the hypocenter, they grow smaller as they are attenuated by the ...
Different fields of application have different definitions for the term. All the meanings are very similar in concept: In chemistry, the transmission coefficient refers to a chemical reaction overcoming a potential barrier; in optics and telecommunications it is the amplitude of a wave transmitted through a medium or conductor to that of the incident wave; in quantum mechanics it is used to ...
Collective matter waves are used to model phenomena in solid state physics; standing matter waves are used in molecular chemistry. Matter wave concepts are widely used in the study of materials where different wavelength and interaction characteristics of electrons, neutrons, and atoms are leveraged for advanced microscopy and diffraction ...
Examples of waves are sound waves, light, water waves and periodic electrical signals in a conductor. A sound wave is a variation in air pressure, while in light and other electromagnetic radiation the strength of the electric and the magnetic field vary. Water waves are variations in the height of a body of water.