Experiment measuring the speed of light in moving water
This article is about the experiment to measure the relative speed of light in a moving medium. For Fizeau's experiment to measure the absolute speed of light in air, see Fizeau's measurement of the speed of light in air.
Figure 1. Apparatus used in the Fizeau experiment
The Fizeau experiment[1][2][3] was carried out by Hippolyte Fizeau in 1851 to measure the relative speeds of light in moving water. Fizeau used a special interferometer arrangement to measure the effect of movement of a medium upon the speed of light.
According to the theories prevailing at the time, light traveling through a moving medium would be dragged along by the medium, so that the measured speed of the light would be a simple sum of its speed through the medium plus the speed of the medium. Fizeau indeed detected a dragging effect, but the magnitude of the effect that he observed was far lower than expected. When he repeated the experiment with air in place of water he observed no effect. His results seemingly supported the partial aether-drag hypothesis of Fresnel, a situation that was disconcerting to most physicists. Over half a century passed before a satisfactory explanation of Fizeau's unexpected measurement was developed with the advent of Albert Einstein's theory of special relativity. Einstein later pointed out the importance of the experiment for special relativity, in which it corresponds to the relativistic velocity-addition formula when restricted to small velocities.
Although it is referred to as the Fizeau experiment, Fizeau was an active experimenter who carried out a wide variety of different experiments involving measuring the speed of light in various situations.
^Becker, Richard; Sauter, Fritz (1 January 1982). Electromagnetic Fields and Interactions. Courier Corporation. p. 308. ISBN 978-0-486-64290-1. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
^Rohrlich, Fritz (25 August 1989). From Paradox to Reality: Our Basic Concepts of the Physical World. Cambridge University Press. p. 54. ISBN 978-0-521-37605-1. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
^Rosser, W. G. V. (6 January 1992). Introductory Special Relativity. CRC Press. p. 113. ISBN 978-0-85066-838-4. Retrieved 9 March 2023.
The Fizeauexperiment was carried out by Hippolyte Fizeau in 1851 to measure the relative speeds of light in moving water. Fizeau used a special interferometer...
light in moving water in an experiment known as the Fizeauexperiment. Fizeau was born in Paris to Louis and Beatrice Fizeau. He married into the de Jussieu...
fringes. The term Fizeau interferometer also refers to an interferometric arrangement used by Hippolyte Fizeau in a famous 1851 experiment that seemingly...
apparently confirmed by the Fizeauexperiment (1851), Stokes' theory was apparently confirmed by the Michelson–Morley experiment (1881, 1887). Hendrik Lorentz...
was preferred because his dragging coefficient was confirmed by the Fizeauexperiment in 1851, which measured the speed of light in moving liquids. Albert...
was directly demonstrated by the Fizeauexperiment (1851). It was later shown that all first-order optical experiments must give a negative result due...
Michelson–Morley experiment, and the mathematical concept of local time (1895) to explain the aberration of light and the Fizeauexperiment. This resulted...
notable experiments in physics. The list includes only experiments with Wikipedia articles. For hypothetical experiments, see thought experiment. Bell tests...
scientific measurements in the mid-1800s, such as the Fizeauexperiment and the Michelson–Morley experiment, that puzzling discrepancies began to be noted between...
What would be the speed of light in flowing water? In 1851, Fizeau conducted an experiment to answer this question, a simplified representation of which...
cable, the setup is effectively a combination of a Sagnac experiment and the Fizeauexperiment. In glass the speed of light is slower than in vacuum, and...
\end{aligned}}} where λ0 is the wavelength in vacuum. As shown in the Fizeauexperiment, when light is transmitted through a moving medium, its speed relative...
Morley (1886) repeating the experiment of Fizeau (1851), contradicting Michelson’s interpretation of his 1881 experiment; Michelson–Morley (1887), more...
thought experiments and real-world experiments in the area of quantum theory and relativity theory and other fields of physics. These include: The Fizeau experiment...
it, he could explain the aberration of light and the result of the Fizeauexperiment. In 1900 and 1904, Henri Poincaré called local time Lorentz's "most...
Kohlrausch (193,088 miles/second) and the speed of light determined by the Fizeauexperiment (195,647 miles/second). Based on their same speed, he concluded that...
which the aether is fully dragged by matter. However, other experiments like the Fizeauexperiment and the effect of aberration disproved that model. A possible...
with the Fizeauexperiment, the aberration of light, and more indirectly the negative aether drift tests such as the Michelson–Morley experiment, formed...
particular he carried out a replication of Hippolyte Fizeau's method to measure the speed of light (see Fizeau's measurement of the speed of light in air), introducing...
Global Information