Thread: Speeds of sounds through mediums

Sooooo we all know sound travels more quickly through mediums with higher densities and temperatures.

I was wondering if sound could travel faster through an extreemly dense solid, or an extreemly hot plasma (or something)

Has this ever been tested? My guess is it really depends on how hot or dense a medium is, but is there a limit to how dense or how hot something (something as in anything) can get?

Originally Posted by Tabasco_Sauce

Sooooo we all know sound travels more quickly through mediums with higher densities and temperatures.

I was wondering if sound could travel faster through an extreemly dense solid, or an extreemly hot plasma (or something)

Has this ever been tested? My guess is it really depends on how hot or dense a medium is, but is there a limit to how dense or how hot something (something as in anything) can get?

There is no limit, so it is entirely possible that the speed of sound could be the SAME as the speed of light inside the singularity of a blackhole (which has infinate density)

And they'd both be zero!

It really does not matter how dense the medium is, the speed of sound cannot approach that of light, sound is merely a compression wave travelling through a medium, the atoms physically move, since they are matter, they cannot travel at light speed.

By the by, does anybody know offhand what happens to the speed of sound for a material that is placed under tension? Or anything about transverse wave velocity v compression wave velocity in a material under tension?

Speed of sound in a medium depends on bulk modulus of elasticity and dunsity.
B=Bulk modulus of elasticity
V=(B/(density))^(1/2)

Originally Posted by Farsight

By the by, does anybody know offhand what happens to the speed of sound for a material that is placed under tension? Or anything about transverse wave velocity v compression wave velocity in a material under tension?

V=speed of sound
x=mass per unit length
T=Tension in the string

V=(T/x)^(1/2)

Thanks anandsatya.

Then i am wondering sound should travel faster in iron than in air.

It does.

I was just wondering if sound energy be converted into light energy how could it be.

Sound is the motion of matter, a compression wave, light is an energy within itself, so NOPE not possible except by using sound waves to convert first to mechanical, then electrical, then electromagnetic energy.