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8 October 2015 Fizeau's "aether-drag" experiment in the undergraduate laboratory
Renaud Mathevet, Pierre Labastie, Thierry Lahaye
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Proceedings Volume 9793, Education and Training in Optics and Photonics: ETOP 2015; 97931G (2015) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2223112
Event: Education and Training in Optics and Photonics: ETOP 2015, 2015, Bordeaux, France
Abstract
We describe a simple realization of Fizeau’s “aether-drag” experiment. Using an inexpensive setup, we measure the phase shift induced by moving water in a laser interferometer and find good agreement with the relativistic composition of velocities law or, in the terms of 19th century physics, with Fresnel’s partial-drag theory.

This appealing experiment, particularly suited for an undergraduate laboratory project, not only allows a quantitative measurement of a relativistic effect on a macroscopic system but also constitutes a practical application of important concepts of optics, data acquisition and processing, and fluid mechanics.
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Renaud Mathevet, Pierre Labastie, and Thierry Lahaye "Fizeau's "aether-drag" experiment in the undergraduate laboratory", Proc. SPIE 9793, Education and Training in Optics and Photonics: ETOP 2015, 97931G (8 October 2015); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2223112
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KEYWORDS
Water
Fringe analysis
Mirrors
Velocity measurements
Light sources
Phase measurement
Solids
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