A Star in a Jar!..........SOUND Can Produce LIGHT........Sonoluminescence
Sonoluminescence
Did you know that using sound waves we can produce light through a phenomenal mechanism called sonoluminescence. The experiment basically consists of a spherical chamber of water, speakers to produce the sound waves and a small bubble of air. You can observe to correct experimental set up below.
How Light is Created
The speakers generate a sound wave at a special frequency that matches the spherical chamber in such a wave that the wave creates something called a standing wave, its the same type of wave that is created on a guitar when you pluck the string; read the link to undestand standing waves better.
The standing wave is generated so that in the middle of the sphere of water the air bubble becomes trapped due to the oscillating pressure wave fronts impinging on the air bubble.
As the pressure waves oscillate the air bubble is causes pressure on the bubble and causes the bubble to shrink and expand with the varying pressure wave fronts. You can fine tune the frequency so the bubble collapse and expansion become greater, eventually to reach a point when the collapse is so great is causes enough pressure inside the bubble that the gas in the bubble becomes very hot and highly ionised, which causes strong emissions of light. The bubble is actually flashing but the frequency it is flashing at is ultrasonic, the same as the frequencies of the speakers, so it just looks like a constant source of light.
Pressure is fundamentally related to temperature through the laws of thermodynamics, an increase in pressure causes increase in temperature, and vice verse.
Here is a video showing it in action:-
Interesting Consequences
There are some interesting consequences of this phenomenon, some scientists have observed that very hot temperatures occur in some cases. The observation of the Black Body Radiation of the light emissions indicate temperatures in the range of 10K-100K degrees, and some theorise that even higher tempertures are possible. These temperatures are what we observe in stars, so these reactions are literally causing a Star in a Jar. Stars produce light through nuclear fusion, and they need high temperatures to make the atoms move very fast so they can achieve fusion. Sonoluminescence has this property, but unforunatley the rate of collapse is also important for it to make fusion At the moment is hasn't been achieved but scientists are looking at this as a possiblity. They need to find a way for the collapse to hold longer and not immediatley expand. This is the problem....
I must make clear that this field has not been fully investigated and scientists are still learning, you can read a journal paper in the references below.
The reference can explain this in a lot more depth if anyone is curious.
I hope you enjoyed, feel free to upvote, resteem and follow.
References:-
[1] REVIEWS OF MODERN PHYSICS, VOLUME 74, APRIL 2002, Single-bubble sonoluminescence
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STOPWhat things in nature cause Sonoluminescence?
No naturally occuring processes have been seen to exhibit this phenomenon.
This post has received a 1.42 % upvote from @drotto thanks to: @physics.benjamin.