Question

Optics scientists often use a series of polarizers to continuously tune the intensity of beams of light. To see how, consider a beam of unpolarized light incident on a series of 3 linear polarizers. The orientation of the three polarizers is vertical, rotated at an angle θ from the vertical and rotated 90 degrees from the vertical, respectively.

For what θ will the intensity of the beam emerging from the third polarizer be 10% of the intensity of the original beam? In your reflection, look at the formula you calculate for the intensity as a function of θ and ensure that it gives the result you expect for θ = 0.

Answer 1