Transcript: We are familiar with waves in everyday life, water waves, sound waves, but it’s not obvious that light is a wave or that electromagnetic radiation is a wave because the radiation is based on the oscillations of electric and magnetic fields that are invisible to the eye. However, light and all other forms of electromagnetic radiation do have the characteristics of waves. The fundamental criteria of waves are wavelength, or the distance from one crest or trough of the radiation to the next, and frequency, or how many crests or troughs of the wave pass per second. These two are related directly in the product to the speed of the radiation. Visible light corresponds to extremely small electromagnetic waves, the wavelength about 1/100,000th of an inch, and the frequency incredibly fast, about 5 times 1014 hertz or cycles per second.