Ten Facts About Light

<div xmlns='http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml'>1. Greeks thought our sight came from something dashing out of the eyes and into objects.<br/> <br/> 2. The first determination of “c”, the speed of light in a vacuum, was made by a Danish astronomer using the motion of the moons<br/> of Jupiter.<br/> <br/> 3. In glass light slows down a bit, bending its trajectory and allowing the making of lenses.<br/> <br/> 4. Particles traveling faster than light <b>IN A MEDIUM</b>, release a form of luminous shock wave called <b>Cerenkov radiation</b> that we see<br/> as deep blue light.<br/> <br/> 5. Different colors have slightly different speeds in water, making them bend in slightly different angles. That causes the<br/> rainbow when water droplets are in the<br/> atmosphere.<br/> <br/> 6. Light from the Sun takes 8 minutes and 17 seconds to reach us, but inside the sun the energy takes millions of years to go<br/> from the center to the surface.<br/> <br/> 7. Humans, just like apes and monkeys, have three color receptors that allow us to see all colors. Birds and other non-mammals<br/> have four color receptors which means they can see many more colors than we do.<br/> <br/> 8. The Hubble telescope photographed several galaxies receding from us at speeds above the speed of light.<br/> <br/> 9. When Maxwell developed the equations to describe Electricity and Magnetism, some solutions were waves with about the speed of light. That was later confirmed, and Optics became a part of his theory.<br/> <br/> 10. The difference of the speed of light according to the density of a substance is responsible for ghost cities travelers see in the desert, and is the process that allows the manufacture of fiber optics.</div>

Ten Facts About Light

1. Greeks thought our sight came from something dashing out of the eyes and into objects. 2. The first determination of “c”, the speed of ...

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