5.1: Wave Speed

Sound - An Interactive eBook · LibreTexts

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    From LibreTexts, under CC BY-NC-SA 3.0, as the source states it; its equations are written in TeX, which the PDF shows typeset. This page at LibreTexts.

    There are two different speeds involved with describing a wave. In previous chapters we saw that the individual points on a wave oscillate (up and down for transverse waves, back and forth for longitudinal waves) with simple harmonic motion, just like masses on springs. But the up and down speed of a point on a transverse wave doesn't tell us how fast the wave moves from one place to the next. The wave speed, v, is how fast the wave travels and is determined by the properties of the medium.

    This page titled 5.1: Wave Speed was last modified on Fri, 10 Jul 2020 02:55:02 GMT and is shared under a CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 license and was authored, remixed, and/or curated by Kyle Forinash and Wolfgang Christian via source content that was edited to the style and standards of the LibreTexts platform.