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Sound is transmitted through gases, plasma, and liquids as longitudinal waves, also called compression waves. It requires a medium to propagate. Through solids, however, it can be transmitted as both longitudinal waves and transverse waves.
An acoustic wave is a mechanical wave that transmits energy through the movements of atoms and molecules. Acoustic waves transmit through fluids in a longitudinal manner (movement of particles are parallel to the direction of propagation of the wave); in contrast to electromagnetic waves that transmit in transverse manner (movement of particles at a right angle to the direction of propagation ...
In acoustics, acoustic attenuation is a measure of the energy loss of sound propagation through an acoustic transmission medium. Most media have viscosity and are therefore not ideal media. When sound propagates in such media, there is always thermal consumption of energy caused by viscosity.
The frequency of a sound is defined as the number of repetitions of its waveform per second, and is measured in hertz; frequency is inversely proportional to wavelength (in a medium of uniform propagation velocity, such as sound in air). The wavelength of a sound is the distance between any two consecutive matching points on the waveform.
Absorption is the loss of energy that occurs when a sound wave reflects off of a surface, and refers to both the sound energy transmitted through and dissipated by the surface material. [26] Reverberation is the persistence of sound caused by repeated boundary reflections after the source of the sound stops.
For waves that propagate in a medium, such as sound waves, the velocity of the observer and of the source are relative to the medium in which the waves are transmitted. [3] The total Doppler effect in such cases may therefore result from motion of the source, motion of the observer, motion of the medium, or any combination thereof.
Sound waves have two general characteristics: A disturbance is in some identifiable medium in which energy is transmitted from place to place, but the medium does not travel between two places. Important basic characteristics of waves are wavelength, amplitude, period, and frequency. Wavelength is the length of the repeating wave shape.
Sound pressure or acoustic pressure is the local pressure deviation from the ambient (average or equilibrium) atmospheric pressure, caused by a sound wave. In air, sound pressure can be measured using a microphone, and in water with a hydrophone. The SI unit of sound pressure is the pascal (Pa). [1]