The behavior of a beam of light upon reflection and refraction at a plane

surface is of basic importance in geometrical optics. The study will divulge several
important features which will be in cases of curved surfaces. Plane surfaces always
occur in nature namely cleavage surfaces of crystals, surfaces of liquids etc. They
are very useful in optical instruments to bring about deviations, displacements, to
disperse the light into its constituent colors or to merge the colors into a single
color etc. The most important devices of this type are prisms which are playing a
very vital role in optical instruments. In prisms two surfaces are inclined to each
other. Before to understand the behavior of a light in these inclined surfaces, it
must be understood what happens at a single surface.

TOTAL INTERNAL REFLECTION

We know the speed at which a wave travels is dependent upon the medium in
which it travels through. A number called the refractive index of a substance is a
measure of how much the speed of a wave changes compared to the speed in a
reference medium i.e., air or vacuum.
For light waves the refractive index is given by

Speed of light ∈Air

Refractive index= Speed of Light∈medium

The Refractive index for glass is approximately 1.5, which means that the speed of
light in glass is approximately 1.5 times slower than the speed of light in air,
similarly, the refractive index of water is 1.33. This implies that light rays will not
be as much in water as they are bent in glass. The medium with high refractive
index is called optically denser medium while the medium with low refractive
index is optically rarer medium. When light travels from an optically denser
medium to a rarer medium at the interface, it is partly reflected back into the same
medium and partly refracted to the second medium. This reflection is called the
Iinternal reflection.
When a ray of light enters from a denser medium to a rarer medium, it
bends away from the normal, for example, the ray AO 1 B .The incident ray AO1 is
partially reflected (O1C) and partially transmitted(O1B) or refracted, the angle of
refraction ( r ) being larger than the angle of incidence ( i ). As the angle of
incidence increases, so does the angle of refraction as observed for ray AO 2 . The
angle of incidence is increased further for ray AO3 and hence the angle of
refraction is π/2. The refracted ray is bent so much away from the normal that it
grazes the surface at the interface between the two media. If the angle of incidence
is increased still further (the ray AO4), refraction is not possible, and the incident
ray is totally reflected.

FIG: Refraction and internal reflection of rays from a point ‘A’ in the denser
medium (water) incident at different angles at the interface with a rarer medium
(air).
This is called Total internal reflection. When light gets reflected by a surface,
normally some fraction of it gets transmitted. The reflected ray, therefore, is
always less intense than the incident ray, howsoever smooth the reflecting surface
may be. In total internal reflection, on the other hand, no transmission of light takes
place. The angle of incidence corresponding to an angle of refraction 90º, say
∠AO3N, is called the critical angle (ic) for the given pair of media.
Snell’s law states that if the relative refractive index is less than one then,
since the maximum value of sin r is unity, there is an upper limit to the value of sin
i for which the law can be satisfied, that is, i = ic such that sin ic = n21 For values of
i larger than ic, Snell’s law of refraction cannot be satisfied, and hence no refraction
is possible.
PRISMS:
Prisms play many different roles in Optics; there are prism combinations that serve
as beam splitters, polarizing devices, and interferometers. Despite this diversity,
the vast majority of applications make use of only one of two main prism
functions. First, a prism can serve as a dispersive device, as it does in a variety of
spectrum analyzers, as such it is capable of separating, to some extent, the
constituent frequency components in a polychromatic light beam. The prism
provides a highly useful means of measuring refractive index over a wide range of
frequencies and for a variety of materials (including gases and liquids). Its second
and more common function is to effect a change in the orientation of an image or
in the direction of propagation of a beam. Prisms are incorporated in many optical
instruments, often simply to fold the system into a confined space. There are
inversion prisms, reversion prisms, and prisms that deviate a beam without
inversion or reversion—and all of this without dispersion.
TOTAL INTERNAL REFLECTION IN PRISMS:
The very commonest optical instruments which use the concept of Total Internal
Reflection are “Prisms” which are made of glass with two angles of 45 and one of
90. As shown in fig (a), the light usually enters perpendicular to one of the short
faces, is totally reflected from the hypotenuse, and leaves at right angles to the
other short face. This deviates the rays through a right angle. Such a prism may al
so be used in two other ways which are illustrated in (b) and (c) of the fig. XX.

Fig: Prisms with

TIR. Prisms designed to bend rays by 90º and 180º or to invert image without changing its size
make use of total internal reflection.

Many other forms of prisms which use total internal reflection have been devised
for special purposes. They are described briefly in below section.

TYPES OF PRISMS
There are four main types of prisms: dispersion prism, deviation, or reflection
prism, rotation prism, and displacement prisms. Deviation, displacement, and
rotation prisms are common in imaging applications; dispersion prisms are strictly
made for dispersing light, therefore not suitable for any application requiring
quality images.
Dispersion Prisms
Prism dispersion is dependent upon the geometry of the prism and its index
dispersion curve, based on the wavelength and index of refraction of the prism
substrate. The angle of minimum deviation dictates the smallest angle between the
incident ray and the transmitted rays. The green wavelength of light is deviated
more than red, and blue more than both red and green; red is commonly defined as
656.3nm, green as 587.6nm, and blue as 486.1 nm.

Abbe Prism:
The prism consist of a block of glass forming a right prism with 30°–60°–90°
triangular faces. When in use, a beam of light enters face AB, is refracted and
undergoes total internal reflection from face BC, and is refracted again on exiting
face AC. The prism is designed such that one particular wavelength of the light
exits the prism at a deviation angle (relative to the light's original path) of exactly
60°. This is the minimum possible deviation of the prism, all other wavelengths
being deviated by greater angles. By rotating the prism (in the plane of the
diagram) around any point O on the face AB, the wavelength which is deviated by
60° can be selected.
Pellin- Broca prism

The prism consists of a four-sided block of glass shaped as a right prism with 90°,

75°, 135°, and 60° angles on the end faces. Light enters the prism through face AB,
undergoes total internal reflection from face BC, and exits through faceAD.
The refraction of the light as it enters and exits the prism is such that one
particular wavelength of the light is deviated by exactly 90°. As the prism is
rotated around an axis O, the line of intersection of bisector of ∠BAD and the
reflecting face BC, the selected wavelength which is deviated by 90° is changed
without changing the geometry or relative positions of the input and output beams.

The prism is commonly used to separate a single required wavelength from a light
beam containing multiple wavelengths, such as a particular output line from a
multi-line laser due to its ability to separate beams even after they have undergone
a non-linear frequency conversion. For this reason, they are also commonly used in
optical atomic spectroscopy
Deviation, Rotation, and Displacement Prisms
Prisms that deviate the ray path, rotate the image, or simply displace the image
from its original axis are helpful in many imaging systems. Ray deviations are
usually done at angles of 45°, 60°, 90°, and 180°. This helps to condense system
size or adjust the ray path without affecting the rest of the system setup. Rotation
prisms, such as dove prisms, are used to rotate an image after it is inverted.
Displacement prisms maintain the direction of the ray path, yet adjust its relation to
the normal.
Most commonly used prism in optics, imaging and photonics industries
Equilateral Prism:

The function of these prisms is to disperse white light in to its component lights.
This prism is used in spectroscopy, Telecommunications and Wavelength
Separation.

Littrow Prism:

The function of uncoated Littrow prism is to disperse white light into its
component colors. The coated Littrow prism deviate the ray path by 60°. The
image formed is right handed.

The Littrow Prisms are used in Spectroscopy (uncoated) and Multi Spectral Laser
System Tuning (Coated).
Right Angle Prism
The function of Right angled prism is to deviate the ray path by 90°. The image
formed is left handed and is used in combination for Image/Beam displacement.

The prism is used in Endoscopy, Microscopy, Laser Alignment and Medical

Instrumentation.

Penta Prism:
The penta prism will deviate the beam by 90° without affecting the orientation of
the image. The image formed is right handed. Note that two of its surfaces must be
silvered. These prisms are often used as end reflectors in small range finders.

Amici roof Prism:

The Amici prism is essentially a truncated right-angle prism with a roof section
added on to the hypotenuse face. In its most common use, it has the effect of
splitting the image down the middle and interchanging the right and left portions.
These prisms are expensive, because the 90° roof angle must be held to roughly 3
or 4 seconds of arc, or a troublesome double image will result. They are often used
in simple telescope systems to correct for the reversion introduced by the lenses.

Rhomboid Prism:
The rhomboid prism displaces the line-of-sight without producing any angular
deviation or changes in the orientation of the image.
Dove Prism:
The Dove prism is a truncated version (to reduce size and weight) of the right-
angle prism, used almost exclusively in collimated light. It has the interesting
property of rotating the image twice as fast as it is itself rotated about the
longitudinal axis.

Porro prism:
The Porro prism is physically the same as the right-angle prism but is used in a
different orientation. After two reflections, the beam is deviated by 180°. Thus, if it
enters right-handed, it leaves right-handed.