Optics Discovery Kit
Experiment #2 : MAGNIFIERS


EQUIPMENT: Lenses A, B, and C, Some Small Crystals, A Small Ruler

MAGNIFY IMAGES Try the following with each of the three lenses:
Place the lens net on a page of printed words (such as this page). Lift the lens slowly away from the page.
1) Describe the image of the letters that you see while looking through the lens and how the image changes as you are moving the lens. Continue pulling the lens farther from the page to a distance greater than the lens's focal length.
2) Describe any new changes that occur to the image as you continue to bring the lens closer to your eye. If the lens can produce an image that is larger than the original object, that lens can be used as a magnifier.
3) Describe differences you notice in the behaviors of the images in the three lenses. 4) Hold the lens very close to your eye and move close to the page to make the letters appear as large as possible. This is the correct way to use a magnifying glass.

EXPLORE MAGNIFI-
CATION
Using only the lenses which are magnifiers, observe the different types of crystals you have been given.
5) Describe any differences you can find between crystals of different materials. Select one very small object such as a tiny printed letter to look at with each magnifier.
6) Draw the object the size that it actually is and then draw it the size that it appears through each magnifier.

HOW IS THIS USEFUL? Magnifiers help us to see very small objects. Some magnifiers are made of many lenses and magnify as much as 1000 times.

List of Other Experiments


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Department of Physics and Astronomy, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287-1504
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Optics Discovery Kit © the Optical Society of America

URL: http://acept.la.asu.edu/PiN/opticskit/expt/experiment2.shtml