Project Schedule

Teams due 11/14   A team is one or two people

Topics due 11/19 Reviewed in class
                           have a second choice available

Slide titles due   11/21 Reviewed in class (pdf)

Draft charts due 11/26 Describe the content (pdf)

Final charts due 12/05 What you are presenting (pdf)

All items to be sent to my by email by class on the dates noted.  I will hand out CD's containing the files at the time of the final presentations.

You may accomplish these milestones early if you wish, but certainly no later than the dates noted.  You will avoid a rush at the end, and competition for lab equipment, by doing your projects early rather than at the last minute.

Lab 12 Materials - Michelson Interferometer First Fringes

Lab 12 Prep Package (pdf file)

Lab 12 Briefing (pdf file)

It's a happy circumstance that today's easily available optical components and mounts allow the construction of various interferometers on the optical table.  It means we can have a lot of fun with quantum optics by being hands-on, and in doing so gain good physical insight.  In this lab we start our sweep through the final theme of the class where we'll bring all of the ideas together into sophisticated probing of the quantum state of light in interferometers, fringe formation, and illustrations of the which-way ambiguity.

For prep you will read Michelson and Morley's original paper, explore some new interferometer concepts and get concrete about carrying out the alignments necessary to get an interferometer to work.

Lab 11 Materials

Lab 11 Prep Package (PDF file)

We will be probing image formation by a telescope mirror and trying out optics cleaning techniques (deferred from last time).  If you do not have a "bye", be prepared for notebook review.

We will head over to the lab from the classroom immediately after the prepared/not-prepared session.

There is open lab from 5 to 6 on Monday and again from 5 to 6 on Wednesday.

Projects:  several students have started on their projects, ahead of schedule.  That's fantastic since later in the quarter table time will be a premium.  Another reason to get a head start is if your project needs us to fabricate or purchase something, then it's good to schedule time for that upfront.  These so-called "long-lead items" that always need attention paid early on in a project.

Lab 10 Prep

First a note on Lab 9X.  All I can say is "Wow!"  We got organized and got that done really efficiently. Things to note:  good prep really helps.  Good planning really helps.  Good organization really helps.  Good communication really helps.  And a clock tick can help too.  (But don't be a slave to it).  What really makes it work though is good teaming.  

Each team please asap email me your data from the experiments done Monday in lab; I will post them on the blog along with the error term analyses and procedure updates.  Analyzing the data is optional.

Lab 10 Prep Pkg (PDF File)

There are no briefing materials for Lab 10.  We will be discussing image formation and optical systems, working with telescope optics on the table, and learning cleaning techniques under the hood.

Lab 9X Prep

Lab 9X will finish off Lab 9, which is too long to do in a single session.  For the prep you will need to work in your 3 groups to come to consensus on your work product.  These are what we discussed in class on Wednesday.  Each team will need to email me pdf's of the two work products before lab.  Each team please also bring 4 hard copies.  One of these copies will be used in the briefing via the overhead projector camera and the remaining three will be distributed among the teams.

Team Mercury:

1)  Determine your team's best value for the error introduced by background light and its drifts.  You will have 2 parts to your analysis:  one regarding the background drifts, and another that explicitly considers the background contribution to the signal in the measurement of I(theta).  You can use any reasonable units you wish as long as they are quantitative.  Generate a 1-page pdf describing how the error values were estimated, and report the values.

2)  Generate a procedure to minimize the errors due to background light in an improved version of Lab 8's Malus' Law experiment.  Generate a 1-page pdf describing this procedure adequate for sharing with the class

Team Gemini

1) Determine your team's best value for the errors introduced by human factors.  You can use any reasonable units as long as they are quantititive.  Generate a 1-page pdf describing how the values were estimated, and report the values.  

2)  Generate a procedure to minimize the errors due to human factors in an improved version of Lab 8's Malus' Law experiment.  Generate a 1-page pdf describing this procedure adequate for sharing with the class.

 

Team Apollo:  

1)  Determine your team's best value for the error introduced by laser drifts.  You can use any reasonable units you wish as long as they are quantitative.  Generate a 1-page pdf describing how the value was estimated, and report the value.  

2)  Generate a procedure to minimize the laser drift error in an improved version of Lab 8's Malus' Law experiment.  Generate a 1-page pdf describing this procedure adequate for sharing with the class.

Lab 9 Materials Available

Lab 9 Prep Package (PDF File)
Lab 9 Briefing Materials (PDF File)
Sample Lab 8 Data for inspection/reference (PDF from Google Spreadsheet)


Lab 9 will build on the good success of 8X.  Here we are adding the idea of an error budget to the idea of an experiment design.  An error budget considers all of the effects that lead to uncertainty in an experiment's results.  By estimating each effect and rolling them all up into a total error you have a good idea of the quality of results you can expect.  An error budget is also a good debugging tool.  If you see more error than expected in a measurement, you can check each term in the error budget to see where either an assumption is wrong or the apparatus is misbehaving.  This provides a systematic way for you make corrections.

Lab 8 Wrap Up / Lab 8X Prep

Lab 8 is one of my favorite labs.  It's where the rubber really meets the road in terms of an experiment, and where the teams really need to work together to get the work done efficiently.  This year the teams are bigger, but you all rose to the challenge and organized yourselves quickly.  It's too bad we don't have a couple of extra radiometers and rotating polarizers - things would go faster and the teams could be smaller for this experiment.

Three things are just plain true that slow us down a little compared to last time the class was taught.  First, we have more people in the class.  Another is that the classroom is in another building from the lab so we have to spend 5-10 minutes in transit.  And finally, we start half an hour later, and folks still want to get home at a reasonable time, so the open lab time is shorter.

And so we didn't quite finish.  Another half-hour would have done it.  We'll wrap it up next time, starting with 8E and moving to 8F.  We'll call this combo Lab 8X (for 8-extended).

For Lab 8X prep, complete the following tasks:

1.  Make sure your data for experiment 8A-8D is complete and recorded in the proper format.
2.  Write down at least 3 good questions you have about the experiment or your data.
3.  Compute how many laser photons at a time were in your polarizing filter.  Record explicitly any assumptions you needed to make.
4.  Enumerate the 6 mechanical degrees of freedom (three coordinates and 3 angles) of the polarizer in its mount and how those degrees of freedom are made repeatable each time when the mount is blocked on the table.

A polarizer in its mount blocked on the table with 3 bolts

The other polarizer on the table, but unblocked

Finally, the lab will be open 5-6 PM this coming Monday, October 22, with the table set up for Lab 8.