Physical interpretation of the fringe shift measured on Michelson interferometer in optical media

TL;DR

This paper investigates how the fringe shift in Michelson interferometers depends on the medium's particle concentration and refractive index, revealing a link to Earth's velocity relative to aether and explaining negative experimental results.

Contribution

It provides experimental evidence of fringe shift dependence on air pressure and refractive index, and introduces a law explaining negative results in Michelson-type experiments.

Findings

Fringe shift appears only at certain particle concentrations in the medium.

The fringe shift depends on the refractive index with an S-shaped curve.

Earth's velocity relative to aether varies from 140 to 480 km/s.

Abstract

I have found experimentally that in vacuum (refractive index $n$ = 1.) the shift of interference fringe in Michelson interferometer is absent because of the absence of particles on the light path. The shift of interference fringe appears only at a certain concentration of particles in the luminiferous medium. The increase of the remnant air pressure in the optical tubes of the interferometer (of the length 6 m in each arm) from 1 mm Hg to 1500 mm Hg reveals first indications of the interference fringe shift (about 0.015 of its width) only at the air pressure 300 mm Hg ($n$ = 1.00014...). The increase of the air pressure in optical tubes up to 760 mm Hg ($n$ = 1.0003...) adds twice the amplitude of the harmonic shift of the interference fringe giving ~0.03, and at the pressure 1500 mm Hg the harmonic fringe shift ~0.06 became conspicuous. The S-shaped with the change of sign dependence of the fringe shift on the index of refraction $n$ was found. Thus the estimation of the horizontal projection of the velocity of the Earth relative to aether is obtained. At the latitude of Obninsk this velocity varies depending on the time of day and night within 140 - 480 km/s. The forth version of the report is complemented with the account of the harmful effect on registering the shift $\Delta X_m$ of the interference fringe of the improperly installed in turning-points of the zigzag light path glass mirrors. The nullifying of the shift in air interferometers may occur because of opposite signs of contributions of the air and glass optical media through the discovered by me law $\Delta X_m \sim l\Delta\epsilon(1-\Delta\epsilon)$. This may be the cause of obtaining negative results in majority of Michelson-type experiments known to date.