Longitudinal wave and seismic P-waves (created by earthquakes and explosions). In longitudinal waves, the displacement of the medium is parallel to the propagation of the wave, and waves can be either straight or round. A wave along the length of a stretched Slinky toy, where the distance between coils increases and decreases, is a good visualization. In the case of longitudinal harmonic sound waves, the frequency and wavelength can be described by the formula where: The quantity "x"/"c" is the time that the wave takes to travel the distance "x". The ordinary frequency ("f") of the wave is given by The wavelength
A Brief History of Time chapter. Some theories say that light acts like particles even though it really is made of waves; one theory that says this is Planck's quantum hypothesis. A different theory also says that light waves also act like particles; a theory that says this is Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. Light waves have "crests" and "troughs". The highest point of a wave is the crest, and the lowest part of the wave is a trough. Sometimes more than one of these waves can interfere with each other - the crests and the troughs line up. This is called "light interference". When light waves