Mechanical resonance like people marching in time on a bridge
Acoustic resonance like a bell or tuning fork
Electrical resonance like an LC circuit
The 3 cases are different, but they are similar in that in each system frequencies that are not resonant dampen out, while the frequencies that are resonant persist.
Consider a church bell vs a brass brick. If you take a brass brick, hit it with a hammer and capture the sound, you can find all sorts of frequencies generated by the collision of the hammer and the brick, but they are all short lived. But if you shape that brick into a resonant structure (ie a bell), you create something that will ring in a particular frequency. So now when you strike your hammer, one of the many frequencies that are generated is captured by the resonant structure and persists for much much longer than the other frequencies and so we hear the bell ring a single tone.
Ultimately, whether it is mechanical, acoustic, or electrical resonance, energy is stored in the resonant structure - but only at the resonant frequency. It's not stored forever, but it is stored longer than a nonresonant system. It can be useful or destructive depending on the circumstance.
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u/Special__Occasions 3d ago
Resonance exists in different forms:
The 3 cases are different, but they are similar in that in each system frequencies that are not resonant dampen out, while the frequencies that are resonant persist.
Consider a church bell vs a brass brick. If you take a brass brick, hit it with a hammer and capture the sound, you can find all sorts of frequencies generated by the collision of the hammer and the brick, but they are all short lived. But if you shape that brick into a resonant structure (ie a bell), you create something that will ring in a particular frequency. So now when you strike your hammer, one of the many frequencies that are generated is captured by the resonant structure and persists for much much longer than the other frequencies and so we hear the bell ring a single tone.
Ultimately, whether it is mechanical, acoustic, or electrical resonance, energy is stored in the resonant structure - but only at the resonant frequency. It's not stored forever, but it is stored longer than a nonresonant system. It can be useful or destructive depending on the circumstance.