The goal of this experiment is to determine the index of refraction of an unknown transparent material. Since this is an application experiment, remember that you need to use two independent methods. Hint: One method should involve total internal reflection

1) Total internal reflection

2) Snell's law

Explanation:

As already mentioned in the question, on way of determining the refractive index is to use the idea of total internal reflection. In that case, we measure the critical angle. This is than angle of incidence in the material, for which the angle of refraction is 90°.

n=1/sinC

Alternatively, we could use Snell's law. In this case, we measure the angles of incidence and refraction.

Refractive index = sini/sinr