If the answer is YES, a related follow-up question: if each visible color of the spectrum were to measure a centimeter in width, how far would I have to move the sensor from the red to detect the change from infrared to microwave, then to radio?
In the knowledge that Sir William Herschel discovered infrared by repeating Newton’s experiment, but with a thermometer to measure the temperature of each component of the spectrum, and after placing the thermometer a bit to the side of the red light, in darkness, noticed quite by accident that the device would still register heat, therefore an invisible yet very real component of light was there, warming the thermometer.
In theory yes, in practice, I think it would depend what your prism is made of. A given material is not transparent to all wavelengths.
My thoughts exactly.
If you want to refract something other than visible light, you may need to switch to some unexpected materials, like some ceramics or plastics. The material has to be transparent in the wavelength you’re interested in, so optical transparency probably doesn’t align with that at all. A special prism like this won’t look as cool as a piece of glass or transparent plastic.
The size can’t be smaller than the wavelength you’re interested in. If you’re ok with a prism the size of a bus, you can use it refract radio waves. If a traditional pocket sized prism is more like your thing, then radio waves are out of the question, but microwaves should still be fine.
There’s an old Sixty Symbols video where they build microwave prisms out of triangular pieces of cardboard filled with loose pellets of wax. Since the pellets are smaller than the wavelength of the microwaves, they behave as though the prism were solid wax.
Total Internal Reflection - Sixty Symbols
Official expensive microwave prisms are made from foam that very closely resembles the PEfoam you put under wooden flooring.
Well, 300mHz has a 1 meter wavelength, so you refract some portable radio transmissions
If you’re interested in 1 m wavelength, the prism has to be bigger than that. Let’s go with 2 m to be on the safe side, you could probably move a prism like that with a lorry.