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 light in a vacuum, was made by a Danish astronomer using the m…

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