Paraxial light rays approach a transparent sphere parallel to an optical axis passing through the center of the sphere. The rays come to a focus on the far surface of the sphere. What is the sphere's index of refraction?

BIO A dentist uses a curved mirror to view the back side of teeth in the upper jaw. Suppose she wants an upright image with a magnification of 1.5 when the mirror is 1.2 cm from a tooth. Should she use a convex or a concave mirror? What focal length should it have?

There's one angle of incidence β onto a prism for which the light inside an isosceles prism travels parallel to the base and emerges at angle β. A laboratory measurement finds that β=52.2° for a prism shaped like an equilateral triangle. What is the prism's index of refraction?

You're visiting the shark tank at the aquarium when you see a 2.5-m-long shark that appears to be swimming straight toward you at 2.0 m/s. What is the shark's actual speed through the water? You can ignore the glass wall of the tank.

Optical engineers need to know the cone of acceptance of an optical fiber. This is the maximum angle that an entering light ray can make with the axis of the fiber if it is to be guided down the fiber. What is the cone of acceptance of an optical fiber for which the index of refraction of the core is 1.55 while that of the cladding is 1.45? You can model the fiber as a cylinder with a flat entrance face.

A 2.0-cm-tall candle flame is 2.0 m from a wall. You happen to have a lens with a focal length of 32 cm. How many places can you put the lens to form a well-focused image of the candle flame on the wall? For each location, what are the height and orientation of the image?

BIO A keratometer is an optical device used to measure the radius of curvature of the eye's cornea—its entrance surface. This measurement is especially important when fitting contact lenses, which must match the cornea's curvature. Most light incident on the eye is transmitted into the eye, but some light reflects from the cornea, which, due to its curvature, acts like a convex mirror. The keratometer places a small, illuminated ring of known diameter 7.5 cm in front of the eye. The optometrist, using an eyepiece, looks through the center of this ring and sees a small virtual image of the ring that appears to be behind the cornea. The optometrist uses a scale inside the eyepiece to measure the diameter of the image and calculate its magnification. Suppose the optometrist finds that the magnification for one patient is 0.049. What is the absolute value of the radius of curvature of her cornea?