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Negative Birefringence

September 10, 2007
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Liquid crystals are found to be birefringent, due to their anizotropic nature. That is, they demonstrate double refraction (having two indices of refraction). Light polarized parallel to the director has a different index of refraction (that is to say it travels at a different velocity) than light polarized perpendicular to the director.

Negative birefringence – yellow when is parallel to the light, and blue when is perpendicular.

from → Mnemonics, USMLE
6 Comments leave one →
  1. dokidok permalink*
    March 27, 2008 11:27 am

    I don’t like this post. Gotta fix it…

    Reply
  2. quetzalsol permalink
    April 4, 2008 7:27 pm

    The mnemonic is good but the picture is not. Post this with Gout.

    Reply
  3. dokidok permalink*
    April 5, 2008 5:39 pm

    Thanks! Yes, I made it for negative birefringence of gout crystals. Can you send a good picture for that post?

    Reply
  4. madhukeshwar permalink
    February 20, 2009 12:39 am

    click on image to see , good image

    Reply
  5. thomas permalink
    April 8, 2010 9:41 am

    Thank you for the post. Got finals tomorrow and misplaced my notes on birefringence. I’m in your debt

    Reply
  6. PFEIFFER permalink
    May 30, 2011 11:06 pm

    Do any of you guys have the discount code for USMLE STEP 1 & 2 TOTAL REVIEW software on usmlestep.net ? I emailed their support asking for the discount code, but did not get a response yet.

    Reply

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