Question

what do you understand by lateral shift and lateral displacement

Answer 1

Lateral displacement is the mechanism in which light changes its path when it travels from one medium to the another...The shift in the emergent ray with respect to the incident ray is called lateral shift..It can be observed through a rectangular glass slab...

Answer 2

Both lateral displacement and lateral shift are the same thing

Definition:-

When a denser medium is kept between two parallel faces inside a rare medium and a ray falls upon one of the two parallel faces reflects into the denser medium and comes out of another surface becoming parallel to the incident ray.

In the successive reflection the deviation at first surface is reversed at second surface but the emergent ray deviates literally.

The distance to what an emergent Ray devited from the direction of incident ray when suffers refraction at two parallel surfaces is called as lateral deviation/ displacement.

The lateral displacement/deviation increase with the increase in

• thickness

• angle of incident

• optical density