Physics Commons^™

Reflections In A Polished Tube, Laurence A. Marschall, Emma Beth Marschall

Physics and Astronomy Faculty Publications

When one of us (E.B.M.) dislodged a metal tube from an electric door chime recently, she inadvertently introduced her father to an attractive and instructive optical phenomenon. Looking down the highly polished inner surface of the cylinder we could see a spot surrounded by a series of bright concentric rings. The pattern looked much like the display of fringes produced by a Fabry-Perot or Michelson interferometer, except that the rings were more evenly spaced instead of crowding together strongly near the edge of the field of view. [excerpt]