Who first proposed a wave theory for the propogation of light?

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   juniorsbookposted 14 years ago

   Who first proposed a wave theory for the propogation of light?

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   Chrisagbeposted 14 years ago

   I guess it was Christiaan Huygens in the early eighteenth century.

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   David99999posted 14 years ago

   I believe it was Max Planke. Planke's discovery paved the way for present-day Quantum Physics.
   
   Good question!

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   minsoposted 14 years ago

   The wave nature of light was first established by Maxwell in 1864 when he formulated an equation to represent electromagnetic nature of light. In 1880, Hertz discovered the existence of electromagnetic waves at radio frequencies which can be used for communication.
   
   Later the discovery of x-rays by Rontgen proved the wave theory of light by the evidence that a simple light can not pass through opaque things but x-rays, a form of light, can. He got Nobel prize for his discovery in 1901, the first Nobel Prize.
   
   Einstein's discovery of photo electric effect and Crompton's discovery of scattering of X-rays proved the particle nature of light. Both these discoveries got Nobel prize and helped to understand the dual nature of light when combined with other discoveries.
   
   Max Planck discovered energy quanta for which he got Nobel prize in 1918 but this discovery was not considered as a proof for particle nature of light at that time neither by Planck nor Nobel committee. But this discovery became an important foundation for quantum physics.

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   saanj Hposted 14 years ago

   hi
   
   In the seventeenth century, two theories of light - (i) Newton's corpuscular theory and (ii) Huygens' wave theory - were proposed. In the early stages, Newton's theory was more widely accepted than Huygens' theory. Later on, however, it was realized that Newton's theory suffered from many drawbacks and led to conclusions which were contradictory to the experimental results. Therefore Newton's theory was discarded in favor of Huygens' theory.
   
   The wave theory of light was proposed in 1678 by a Dutch physicist, Christian Huygens.
   
   Sir Isaac Newton, held the theory that light was made up of tiny particles.
   
   In 1803, Thomas Young studied the interference of light waves by shining light through a screen with two slits equally separated, the light emerging from the two slits, spread out according to Huygen's principle.
   
   Later in 1815, Augustin Fresnel supported Young's experiments with mathematical calculations.
   
   In 1900 Max Planck proposed the existence of a light quantum, a finite packet of energy which depends on the frequency and velocity of the radiation.

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