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Validating · emergence

Wave interference

When two coherent wave sources overlap, do they interfere — and does the pattern obey the wave equation's dispersion relation?

▶ Launch the interactive simulation

How the lab tests it

Drive two in-phase point sources on a 2-D membrane (the wave equation ∂²u/∂t² = c²∇²u, absorbing borders), watch their circular waves overlap, and measure the wavelength λ from the field's spatial autocorrelation.

What it checks

interference — bright bands where the paths differ by a whole wavelength, dark nodal lines where they differ by a half — and the dispersion relation c = λ·f (the measured phase speed matching the model's wave speed)

This is one world in the PHS lab — 91 interactive simulations, each posing a question and measuring the answer. See the catalogued findings.