Acoustics with a tablet or smartphone

Abstract

The text of the paper is based on a diploma thesis, which is freely available and includes experiments in the following thematic areas: demonstration of shocks for oscillating movements, an acoustic analogy of scanning tunnelling microscopy, measuring the speed of sound in air, studying sound properties (especially sound spectra of tones played on various musical instruments), estimating measurement of volume and intensity of sound, audiometric measurement, demonstration of the sonar principle and the Doppler effect. Measurement using tablets and smartphones is undoubtedly one of the ways to make more meaningful use of these devices in teaching in the spirit of "Bring Your Own Device" trends and is discussed in several articles and instructions (a somewhat more representative list current to the date can be found in the thesis). In this work, we focus on experiments in acoustics and most of them make use of a freely available PhyPhox application. As an example, we discuss in more detail the four experiments which use a sound level sensor and a tone generator on a smartphone.