Science Buddies: "Ask an Expert"

If the gravitational pull of an object like a black hole affects light, and black holes spin at incredible speeds, could light approaching but not entering the event horizon at the correct angle be sped up or slowed down.

If light is a wave could the wavelength be shortened or lengthened by the gravitation to where it simply leaves the visible part of the spectrum.

If light is a particle would this gravitational effect cause the light to blink as the particles become further or less apart.

If light is both particle and wave could the particles cause the wave (or wave cause the particle) to return to a constant speed once past the gravitational effect?

Would any of this mean the speed of light could possibly not be constant.

Would any of this mean it is possible to accelerate past the speed of light.

Thank you.

Hi Pepsiholic,

OK, first of all, we're here primarily to help K-12 students with their science projects. If you're a student and trying to plan an experiment, you might want to look at our project guide for help in defining a testable hypothesis:

https://www.sciencebuddies.org/science- ... ndex.shtml

If you're mainly interesting in discussing these concepts, you might find likeminded people somewhere like http://www.physicsforums.com. For example, I ran across this conversation:

http://www.physicsforums.com/archive/in ... 66436.html

As for most of your questions, my first inclination is to say 'no'. But there are a number of related concepts that might interest you:

Changes in wavelength are commonly referred to as 'redshift' (increased wavelength = decreased energy per photon) or 'blueshift' (decreased wavelength = increased energy per photon). Note that light can change wavelength without changing speed. However, yes, light could be redshifted or blueshifted out of the visible spectrum. Many telescopes used by astrophysicists detect light in other parts of the spectrum, and you've probably seen images representing light that you couldn't have seen with the naked eye.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_redshift

Massive objects can bend the path of light; this was actually a key prediction of general relativity. But this also does not imply a change in light's speed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_lens
http://www.theory.caltech.edu/people/pa ... ertop.html

Light slows down while traveling through a material with an index of refraction greater than one -- basically, anything other than vacuum.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of_r ... d_of_light

Amanda

just to add:

Would any of this mean the speed of light could possibly not be constant.
- The speed of light is a constant (299 792 458 m / s), just like there are 12 eggs in a dozen eggs. The speed of a light wave or particle can not be constant, meaning that it can accelerate.

Would any of this mean it is possible to accelerate past the speed of light.
-Theoretically no, because:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speed_of_l ... _on_speeds go to "2.1 Upper limit on speeds "