# 0.6 Sound

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## Introduction

Now that we have studied the basics of longitudinal waves, we are ready to study sound waves in detail.

Have you ever thought about how amazing your sense of hearing is? It is actually pretty remarkable. There are many types of sounds: a car horn, a laughing baby, a barking dog, and somehow your brain can sort it all out. Though it seems complicated, it is rather simple to understand once you learn a very simple fact. Sound is a wave. So you can use everything you know about waves to explain sound.

## Characteristics of a sound wave

Since sound is a wave, we can relate the properties of sound to the properties of a wave. The basic properties of sound are: pitch, loudness and tone.

## Pitch

The frequency of a sound wave is what your ear understands as pitch. A higher frequency sound has a higher pitch, and a lower frequency sound has a lower pitch. In [link] sound A has a higher pitch than sound B. For instance, the chirp of a bird would have a high pitch, but the roar of a lion would have a low pitch.

The human ear can detect a wide range of frequencies. Frequencies from 20 to 20 000 Hz are audible to the human ear. Any sound with a frequency below 20 Hz is known as an infrasound and any sound with a frequency above 20 000 Hz is known as an ultrasound .

[link] lists the hearing ranges of some common animals compared to humans.

 lower frequency (Hz) upper frequency (Hz) Humans 20 20 000 Dogs 50 45 000 Cats 45 85 000 Bats 20 120 000 Dolphins 0,25 200 000 Elephants 5 10 000

## Investigation : range of wavelengths

Using the information given in [link] , calculate the lower and upper wavelengths that each species can hear. Assume the speed of sound in air is $344\phantom{\rule{2pt}{0ex}}\mathrm{m}·\mathrm{s}{}^{-1}$ .

## Loudness

The amplitude of a sound wave determines its loudness or volume. A larger amplitude means a louder sound, and a smaller amplitude means a softer sound. In [link] sound C is louder than sound B. The vibration of a source sets the amplitude of a wave. It transmits energy into the medium through its vibration. More energetic vibration corresponds to larger amplitude. The molecules move back and forth more vigorously.

The loudness of a sound is also determined by the sensitivity of the ear. The human ear is more sensitive to some frequencies than to others. The volume we receive thus depends on both the amplitude of a sound wave and whether its frequency lies in a region where the ear is more or less sensitive.

## Tone

Tone is a measure of the quality of the sound wave. For example, the quality of the sound produced in a particular musical instruments depends on which harmonics are superposed and in which proportions. The harmonics are determined by the standing waves that are produced in the instrument. For general interest see Physics of music , which explains the physics of music in greater detail.

The quality (timbre) of the sound heard depends on the pattern of the incoming vibrations, i.e. the shape of the sound wave. The more irregular the vibrations, the more jagged is the shape of the sound wave and the harsher is the sound heard.

can someone help me with some logarithmic and exponential equations.
20/(×-6^2)
Salomon
okay, so you have 6 raised to the power of 2. what is that part of your answer
I don't understand what the A with approx sign and the boxed x mean
it think it's written 20/(X-6)^2 so it's 20 divided by X-6 squared
Salomon
I'm not sure why it wrote it the other way
Salomon
I got X =-6
Salomon
ok. so take the square root of both sides, now you have plus or minus the square root of 20= x-6
oops. ignore that.
so you not have an equal sign anywhere in the original equation?
Commplementary angles
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Sherica
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Sherica
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Tamia
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a perfect square v²+2v+_
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algebra 2 Inequalities:If equation 2 = 0 it is an open set?
or infinite solutions?
Kim
The answer is neither. The function, 2 = 0 cannot exist. Hence, the function is undefined.
Al
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Kristine 2*2*2=8
Differences Between Laspeyres and Paasche Indices
No. 7x -4y is simplified from 4x + (3y + 3x) -7y
is it 3×y ?
J, combine like terms 7x-4y
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Asali
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Samantha
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Asali
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Need to simplify the expresin. 3/7 (x+y)-1/7 (x-1)=
. After 3 months on a diet, Lisa had lost 12% of her original weight. She lost 21 pounds. What was Lisa's original weight?
what's the easiest and fastest way to the synthesize AgNP?
China
Cied
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I start with an easy one. carbon nanotubes woven into a long filament like a string
Porter
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Porter
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Yasmin
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Cesar
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Yes, Nanotechnology has a very fast field of applications and their is always something new to do with it...
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Stotaw
In this morden time nanotechnology used in many field . 1-Electronics-manufacturad IC ,RAM,MRAM,solar panel etc 2-Helth and Medical-Nanomedicine,Drug Dilivery for cancer treatment etc 3- Atomobile -MEMS, Coating on car etc. and may other field for details you can check at Google
Azam
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Prasenjit
after 100 year this will be not nanotechnology maybe this technology name will be change . maybe aftet 100 year . we work on electron lable practically about its properties and behaviour by the different instruments
Azam
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Prasenjit
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Damian
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At high concentrations (>0.01 M), the relation between absorptivity coefficient and absorbance is no longer linear. This is due to the electrostatic interactions between the quantum dots in close proximity. If the concentration of the solution is high, another effect that is seen is the scattering of light from the large number of quantum dots. This assumption only works at low concentrations of the analyte. Presence of stray light.
the Beer law works very well for dilute solutions but fails for very high concentrations. why?
how did you get the value of 2000N.What calculations are needed to arrive at it
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