Journal
AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PHYSICS
Volume 78, Issue 3, Pages 270-276Publisher
AMER ASSOC PHYSICS TEACHERS AMER INST PHYSICS
DOI: 10.1119/1.3266970
Keywords
Faraday effect; harmonic oscillators; light polarisation; optical rotation; physics education; Schrodinger equation
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Three calculations of optical Faraday rotation are presented in which a linearly polarized field is incident on a medium of harmonic oscillators in the presence of a longitudinal magnetic field. The rotation of the plane of polarization of the field is evaluated using classical oscillators and the Lorentz force equation, quantum oscillators and the Heisenberg equations of motion, and quantum oscillators and a Schroumldinger equation approach. It is shown that a simple argument, based on the assumption that a circularly polarized field drives either Delta m=1 or Delta m=-1 transitions on absorption (m is the magnetic quantum number), leads to an incorrect result for the Verdet constant.
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