Demonstration of the Inverse Square Law with the aid of a Tablet/smartphone

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates a simple, accurate method for verifying the inverse-square law of light intensity using smartphones, making physics experiments more accessible and reproducible for educational purposes.

Contribution

It introduces a practical, smartphone-based experimental setup to verify the inverse-square law, facilitating easy and precise physics demonstrations in educational settings.

Findings

Successful demonstration of the inverse-square law with smartphones

Method is simple, fast, and reproducible

Potential for teaching related physical laws like gravity and Coulomb's law

Abstract

In this paper we show how to obtain the Inverse-square law of the distance to the light intensity emitted from a small source in a simple, fast and with good precision way. With the aid of two smartphones, free apps and a ruler, one is able to measure the distances between the devices listed (one as a source and the other as a measuring light intensity) and the respective light intensities measured by the probeware in the device. The ease of reproduction of the proposed experiment and the penetration of the use of tablets and smartphones among students and teachers, could make the proposed activity a good alternative to the introduction of physical phenomena which exhibit the same functional dependence, such as the Law of Newton's Universal Gravitation and Coulomb's Law.