Question

The refractive index of glass with respect to air is 1.5. What will be the refractive index of air with respect to glass?

Answer 1

(refractive index of glass with respect to air)×(refractive index of air with respect to glass)=1 . this is normally thought in your class 9or 10. so refractive index of air with respect to glass=1/1.5 =0.67.

Answer 2

Refractive index of air with respect to glass is 0.666.

What is refraction?

• The particle property of light which explains the bending of ray of light when passing through different mediums.

What is refractive index?

• Refractive index is a numeric value which is dimensionless.
• It gives the measure of degree of refraction of any medium.
• The extent to which a ray bends is decided by the value of refractive index.
• Mathematical formula to express refractive index is given as the ratio between speed of light in any medium and the speed of light in vacuum.
• Also, refractive index of any medium with respect to any other medium is given as = $_{a}$μ$_{b}$ which means refractive index of medium b with respect to medium a.

The reciprocal of $_{a}$μ$_{b}$ is  refractive index of medium a with respect to medium b which is $_{b}$μ$_{a}$.

Now, if refractive index of glass with respect to air is $_{air}$μ$_{glass}$ = 1.5 and refractive index of air with respect to glass is $_{glass}$μ$_{air}$ = $\frac{1}{1.5}$ = 0.666.