Light: Reflection and Rarefaction

Maximum Marks – 80 Time allowed – 3 hours

General Instructions – This paper consists of 10 ques of 2 marks, 10 ques of 3 marks and 6 ques of
5 marks. All questions are compulsory. No internal choice is given.

Section A (2 marks each)

Ques 1 Draw a labelled ray diagram of a convex mirror to show the path of the reflected ray
corresponding to the ray which is directed towards the principal focus. Also, mark the angle of
incidence and angle of reflection on it.

Ques 2 Draw the path of a ray of light when it enters one of the faces of a glass slab at an angle of
nearly 45°. Label on it
(i) angle of refraction (ii) angle of emergence (iii) lateral displacement.

Ques 3 A teacher gives a convex lens and a concave mirror of focal length of about 20 cm each to
his student and ask him to find their focal lengths by obtaining the image of a distant object. The
student uses a distant tree as the object and obtains its sharp image, one by one, on a screen. The
distance d1 and d2 between the lens/mirror and the screen in the two cases and the nature of their
respective sharp images are likely to be:
(1) (20 cm, 40 cm) and (erect, erect)
(2) (20 cm, 40 cm) and (inverted, erect)
(3) (20 cm, 20 cm) and (inverted, inverted)
(4) (20 cm, 20 cm) and (erect, inverted)
Give reason for your answer.

Ques 4 List four precautions which a student should observe while determining the focal length of a
given convex lens by obtaining image of a distant object on a screen.

Ques 5 The absolute refractive index of Ruby is 1.7. Find the speed of light in Ruby. The speed of
light in vacuum is 3 × 108 m/sec

Ques 6 The power of a lens is +5 dioptres. What is the nature and focal length of this lens? At what
distance from this lens should an object be placed so as to get its inverted image of the same size ?

Ques 7 The refractive indices of glass and water with respect to air are 3/2 and 4/3 respectively. If
speed of light in glass is 2 × 108 m/sec, find the speed of light in water.

Ques 8 A communications satellite in orbit sends a parallel beam of signals down to earth. If these
signals obey the same laws of reflection as light and are to be focussed onto a small receiving aerial,
what should be the best shape of the metal ‘dish’ used to collect them ?

Ques 9 A man stands 10 m in front of a large plane mirror. How far must he walk before he is 5 m
away from his image ?

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Ques 10 The angle between an incident ray and the mirror is as shown below. The total angle
turned by the ray of light is 70°. What is the value of theta ?

Section B (3 marks each)

Ques 11 When a spherical mirror is held towards the sun and its sharp image is formed on a piece
of carbon paper for some time, a hole is burnt in the carbon paper.

(a) What is the nature of spherical mirror ?

(b) Why is a hole burnt in the carbon paper ?
(c) At which point of the spherical mirror the carbon paper is placed ?
(d) What name is given to the distance between spherical mirror and carbon paper ?
(e) What is the advantage of using a carbon paper rather than a white paper ?

Ques 12 A student holding a mirror in his hand, directed the reflecting surface of the mirror towards
the Sun. He then directed the reflected light on to a sheet of paper held close to the mirror.

(a) What should he do to burn the paper ?

(b) Which type of mirror does he have ?
(c) Will he be able to determine the approximate value of focal length of this mirror from this
activity ? Give reason and draw ray diagram to justify your answer in this case.

Ques 13 A 5 cm tall object is placed at a distance of 30 cm from a convex mirror of focal length 15
cm. Find the position, size and nature of the image formed.

Ques 14 A student wants to project the image of a candle flame on a screen 80 cm in front of a
mirror by keeping the candle flame at a distance of 20 cm from its pole.

i) Which type of mirror should the student use?

ii) Find the magnification of the image produced.
iii) Find the distance between the object and its image.
iv) Draw a ray diagram to show the image formation in this case and mark the
distance between the object and its image.

Ques 15 The image formed by a spherical mirror is real, inverted and is of magnification-2. If the
image is at a distance of 30 cm from the mirror, where is the object placed ? Find the focal length
of the mirror. List two characteristics of the image formed if the object is moved 10 cm
towards the mirror.

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Ques 16 The diagram given below shows an object O and its image I.

Without actually drawing the ray diagram, state the following :

(i) Type of lens (Converging / Diverging)
(ii) Name two optical instruments where such an image is obtained.
(iii) List three characteristics of the image formed if this lens is replaced by a concave mirror of focal
length ‘f ’ and an object is placed at a distance f/2 in front of the mirror.

Ques 17 (a) Water has refractive index 1.33 and alcohol has refractive index 1.36. Which of the two
medium is optically denser ? Give reason for your answer.
(b) Draw a ray diagram to show the path of a ray of light passing obliquely from water to alcohol.
(c) State the relationship between angle of incidence and angle of refraction in above case.

Ques 18 “A lens can form a magnified erect image as well as magnified inverted image of an object
placed in front of it.” State the nature of this lens and draw ray diagrams to justify the above
statement. Mark the positions of O, F and 2F in the diagram.

Ques 19 Define power of a lens. What is its unit? One student uses a lens of focal length 50 cm and
another of -50 cm. What is the nature of the lens and its power used by each of them?

Ques 20 The speed of light in vacuum and in two different glasses is given in table below –
Medium Speed of Light
Vacuum 3 × 108 m/sec
Flint glass 1.86 × 108 m/sec
Crown glass 1.97 × 108 m/sec
(a) Calculate the absolute refractive indexes of flint glass and crown glass .
(b) Calculate the relative refractive index for light going from crown glass to flint glass .

Section C (5 marks each)

Ques 21 (a) A security mirror used in a big showroom has radius of curvature 5 m. If a customer is
standing at a distance of 20 m from the cash counter, find the position, nature and size of the image
formed in the security mirror.
(b) Neha visited a dentist in his clinic. She observed that the dentist was holding an instrument fitted
with a mirror. State the nature of this mirror and reason for its use in the instrument used by dentist.

Ques 22 (A) If the image formed by a mirror for all positions of the object placed in front of it is
always diminished, erect and virtual, state the type of the mirror and also draw a ray diagram to
justify your answer. Write one such mirror and why.
(B) Define the radius of curvature of spherical mirrors. Find the nature and focal length of a
spherical mirror whose radius of curvature is +24cm.

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Ques 23 Suppose you have three concave mirrors A, B and C of focal lengths 10 cm, 15 cm and 20
cm. For each concave mirror, you perform experiment of image formation for three values of object
distances of 10 cm, 20 cm and 30 cm. By giving reason, answer following:

(i) For the three object distances, identify the mirror/ mirrors which will form an image of
magnification – 1.
(ii) Out of the three mirrors identify the mirror which would be preferred to be used for
shaving purposes/makeup.
(iii) For the mirror B draw ray diagram for image formation for object distances 10 cm and
20 cm.

Ques 24 It is desired to obtain an erect image of an object, using concave mirror of focal length of
12 cm.

(i) What should be the range of distance of an object placed in front of the mirror?
(ii)Will the image be smaller or larger than the object? Draw ray diagram to show the
formation of image in this case.
(iii) Where will the image of this object be, if it is placed 24 cm in front of the mirror?
Draw ray diagram for this situation also justify your answer. Show the positions of pole, principal
focus, and the centre of curvature in the above ray diagrams.

Ques 25 Analyse the following observation table showing variation of image distance (v) with object
distance (u) in case of a convex lens and answer the questions that follow, without doing any
calculations:

S.No Object Distance u (cm) Image distance v (cm)

1 -90 + 18
2 - 60 + 20
3 -30 + 30
4 -20 + 60
5 -18 + 90
6 -10 + 100
(i) What is the focal length of the convex lens? Give reason in support of your answer.
(ii) Write the serial number of that observation which is not correct. How did you arrive at this
conclusion?
(iii) Take an appropriate scale to draw ray diagram for the observation at S. No. 4 and find the
approximate value of magnification.

Ques 26 (a) State the laws of refraction of light. Explain the term absolute refractive index of a
medium and write an expression to relate it with the speed of light in vacuum.
(b) The absolute refractive indices of two media ‘A’ and ‘B’ are 2.0 and 1.5 respectively. If the speed
of light in medium ‘B’ is 2 × 108 m/sec, calculate the speed of light in:

(i) Vacuum,
(ii) Medium ‘A’

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