{"id":605325,"date":"2026-07-26T17:39:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T17:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/605325\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T17:39:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T17:39:09","slug":"learning-how-to-bend-light-at-the-orlando-science-center","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/605325\/","title":{"rendered":"Learning how to bend light at the Orlando Science Center"},"content":{"rendered":"

Learning how to bend light at the Orlando Science Center<\/p>\n

Check out this fun activity on this week’s The Science of It, where young minds can learn about reflection and refraction <\/p>\n

\"Victoria<\/a>ORLANDO, Fla. \u2014<\/strong><\/p>\n

It’s July, and that means it’s “Phenomena Month” at the Orlando Science Center \u2014 a monthlong celebration of the science behind everyday (and not-so-everyday) occurrences. <\/p>\n

Today’s goal: get the laser beam from one airport to the other without moving the map itself \u2014 only the angle of the light. <\/p>\n

The trick is in two physics concepts most people haven’t thought about since a high school classroom: reflection and refraction. One redirects light. The other bends it.<\/p>\n

Mirrors handle the redirecting. Point a laser at a mirror’s surface, and the beam bounces off at a matching angle, letting you steer it around corners without changing its color or speed.<\/p>\n

Prisms do something different. As light passes through the angled glass, it slows down and bends \u2014 refraction \u2014 sending the beam off in a new direction depending on the angle it entered. Watching where the light exits the far side of the prism, sometimes with a hand held up as a makeshift screen, is the only way to track where it’s headed next.<\/p>\n

Working the course meant chaining both effects together: send the beam through a prism, catch the bend with a mirror, redirect it again with a second mirror, and repeat until the light finally lands on target.<\/p>\n

The next time you’d want to learn about physics, head to the Orlando Science Center!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Learning how to bend light at the Orlando Science Center Check out this fun activity on this week’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":605326,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[271],"tags":[255686,255688,255669,18,255691,255675,134777,255676,19,17,38598,255677,34659,255678,87529,255679,255690,255689,255671,255670,255672,452,255680,255685,255681,255692,255682,255687,133,255683,244250,51938,255673,255684,2416,255674],"class_list":["post-605325","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-physics","tag-angle","tag-bend","tag-central-florida-things-to-do","tag-eire","tag-everyday","tag-family-activities-orlando","tag-goal","tag-hands-on-science","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-laser-beam","tag-laser-experiment","tag-light","tag-light-and-optics","tag-mirror","tag-mirror-maze","tag-not-so-everyday","tag-occurrence","tag-orlando-attractions","tag-orlando-science-center","tag-phenomena-month","tag-physics","tag-physics-for-kids","tag-prism","tag-prism-experiment","tag-redirecting","tag-reflection-and-refraction","tag-refraction","tag-science","tag-science-exhibits","tag-science-experiments","tag-speed","tag-stem-activities","tag-summer-science","tag-today","tag-wesh-2"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605325","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=605325"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/605325\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/605326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=605325"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=605325"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=605325"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}