2006-09-02 10:42:45 · 8 answers · asked by Anonymous in Education & Reference ➔ Trivia
The prismatic effect of the raindrop (or moisture in the air) breaks apart the beam of white light into its component colours. White light is made up of all colours. Black light is no colour.
When the prismatic lens splits the white light into the different bands of colours, the interstices, between each band, is made up of the colours on either side of it, ranging from all one colour gradually phasing in the next colour, then phasing out the first colour and eventually reaching the second colour. So all colours in the universe are present somewhere in a rainbow.
Awesome, isn't it?
2006-09-02 12:30:04 · answer #1 · answered by old lady 7 · 0⤊ 1⤋
You know that light is made up of a collection of many colors: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet. That is why a prism can take in white light on one side and produce its own mini-rainbow on the other side. To understand rainbows, you have to start by understanding what is happening inside a prism to let it separate white light into its colors.
A prism is a triangular piece of glass or plastic. To get it to produce a mini-rainbow, you allow a narrow strip of white light to fall on one face of the triangle
The dispersion of colors in a prism occurs because of something called the refractive index of the glass. Every material has a different refractive index. When light enters a material (for example, when light traveling through the air enters the glass of a prism), the difference in the refractive index of air and glass causes the light to bend. The angle of bending is different for different wavelengths of light. As the white light moves through the two faces of the prism, the different colors bend different amounts and in doing so spread out into a rainbow.
In a rainbow, raindrops in the air act as tiny prisms. Light enters the raindrop, reflects off of the side of the drop and exits. In the process, it is broken into a spectrum just like it is in a triangular glass prism
The angle between the ray of light coming in and the ray coming out of the drops is 42 degrees for red and 40 degrees for violet. You can see in this diagram that the angles cause different colors from different drops to reach your eye, forming a circular rim of color in the sky -- a rainbow! In a double rainbow, the second bow is produced because droplets can have two reflections internally and get the same effect. The droplets have to be the right size to get two reflections to work.
2006-09-02 11:38:39 · answer #2 · answered by Andrea S 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The colors you see in a rainbow are the colors you see when you separate white light into its separate colors. The sun shines through the water in the atmosphere, acting as a prism which separates the white light into its component colors.
2006-09-02 10:46:09 · answer #3 · answered by arizona wolfman 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The colors is what defines a rainbow. who has ever heard of a rainbow with only one color.
2006-09-02 10:46:09 · answer #4 · answered by kitcatt143 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
based on teh reflection of the light in whcih you are looking from and at
2006-09-02 10:45:38 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 1⤋
I am not sure. Maybe it has something to do with the sun.
2006-09-02 10:44:52 · answer #6 · answered by Girly 2 · 0⤊ 1⤋
refracted light, there are that many angles
2006-09-02 10:45:36 · answer #7 · answered by LuLu 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
have no idea
2006-09-02 14:58:58 · answer #8 · answered by leelee 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋