Visualizing Harmonic Oscillators

Screen Shot 2015-03-18 at 3.41.44 PMHarmonic oscillators form the basis of much of our modern technologies from cell phones to GPS to radio and TV. When multiple frequencies are present in a given signal, we typically rely on the frequency domain (e.g., FFTs) for characterization rather than the time domain. However, this demonstration put on by Harvard does an excellent job of illustrating, in the time domain, traveling waves, standing waves and beat frequencies.

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