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Atmospheric optics. A colorful sky is often due to indirect sunlight being scattered off air molecules and particulates, like smog, soot, and cloud droplets, as shown in this photo of a sunset during the October 2007 California wildfires. Atmospheric optics is "the study of the optical characteristics of the atmosphere or products of ...
Diffuse sky radiation. In Earth's atmosphere, the dominant scattering efficiency of blue light is compared to red or green light. Scattering and absorption are major causes of the attenuation of sunlight radiation by the atmosphere. During broad daylight, the sky is blue due to Rayleigh scattering, while around sunrise or sunset, and especially ...
Star formation. Star formation is the process by which dense regions within molecular clouds in interstellar space, sometimes referred to as "stellar nurseries" or " star -forming regions", collapse and form stars. [1] As a branch of astronomy, star formation includes the study of the interstellar medium (ISM) and giant molecular clouds (GMC ...
Photometric system. In astronomy, a photometric system is a set of well-defined passbands (or optical filters ), with a known sensitivity to incident radiation. The sensitivity usually depends on the optical system, detectors and filters used. For each photometric system a set of primary standard stars is provided.
Stellar classification. In astronomy, stellar classification is the classification of stars based on their spectral characteristics. Electromagnetic radiation from the star is analyzed by splitting it with a prism or diffraction grating into a spectrum exhibiting the rainbow of colors interspersed with spectral lines.
In astronomy, the Great Rift (sometimes called the Dark Rift or less commonly the Dark River) is a dark band caused by interstellar clouds of cosmic dust that significantly obscure ( extinguish) the center and most radial sectors of the Milky Way galaxy from Earth 's perspective. In dark, clear night skies, the rift appears as clear as the ...
v. t. e. Cloud physics is the study of the physical processes that lead to the formation, growth and precipitation of atmospheric clouds. These aerosols are found in the troposphere, stratosphere, and mesosphere, which collectively make up the greatest part of the homosphere. Clouds consist of microscopic droplets of liquid water (warm clouds ...
The Large Sagittarius Star Cloud is the innermost galactic structure that can be observed in visible wavelengths, and the most distant portion of the Milky Way that can be seen with unaided eyes. Being depleted of the gas and dust from which new stars form, the region contains no young blue stars. Instead, the brightest stars are K-type orange ...