FYI, this is standard fare for any undergraduate-level E&M class. The interesting part of deriving the wave equation from Maxwell's Laws, in my opinion, is how

FYI, this is standard fare for any undergraduate-level E&M class. The interesting part of deriving the wave equation from Maxwell's Laws, in my opinion, is how the permittivity and permeability of free space (epsilon_0 and mu_0) can both measured macroscopically in a small laboratory, by measuring forces between electric charges and current-carrying wires. Put these two seemingly unrelated values together and they give you the speed of light! Another FYI - the author of the wiki proof in step 8 showed the vector calculus proof the 'long' (and boring) way, those vector calculus relations can usually be solved MUCH more easily and concisely using the Levi-Cevita algebra. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levi-Civita_symbol http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Levi-Civita_symbol