Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

I am doing the above named project. I am in 9th grade, so I don't have a good grasp of trigonometry. For the project, I am using a laser pointer to measure how much sugar is in water (using a homemade prism with my physics teacher) with the index of refraction. I need help calculating the index of refraction in plain water and in sugar water. Can anyone help me with this math? I haven't done anything this complex yet, so if possible, please try to simplify the explanation. Thanks a ton!

Hello AstroNut42,
Welcome to Science Buddies and congratulations for picking an interesting project!

I think the background section to this project provides a pretty straightforward explanation for calculating the index of refraction:
https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... background

You might want to also read the references given in the bibliography for that section.

Let us know if that helps!