Snell's Law - MCAT Chemical and Physical Foundations of Biological Systems

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Question

An incandescent light bulb is shown through a glass prism. The certain wavlength of the light is then directed into a glass cuvette containing an unknown concentration of protein. Commonly, this process is called spectroscopy and is used to determine the concentrations of DNA, RNA, and proteins in solutions. The indices of reflection of air, glass, and the solution are 1, 1.5, and 1.3, respectively.

The red light, selected for by the prism, is shown through air onto the glass cuvette at an angle of 30o to the normal. At what angle to normal does the light have when it is in the glass?

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Answer

This problem asks us to consider refraction, that is, the bending of light when it enters a new medium. Thinking back to our light formulas in physics, we know that , where n is the index of refraction of the medium and is the angle the light ray makes to normal.

Using the information provided in the pre-question text and the question above, we can solve for .

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