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Why is the ocean blue?
- 1. WHY IS THEOCEAN BLUE?
- 2. Nothing is asmesmerising as the ocean’s blue colour - but what makes it blue?
- 3. SEEN FROM SPACE,LIGHT FROM THE SUN IS WHITE BUT WHEN IT HITS OUR ATMOSPHERE AND THE OCEANS BENEATH IT, DIFFERENT COLOURS BEGIN TO BEHAVE DIFFERENTLY
- 4. IN THE ATMOSPHERE,BLUE LIGHT IS SCATTERED AND RED LIGHT ABSORBED, TO A SMALL DEGREE A PROCESS CALLED RAYLEIGH SCATTERING LORD RAYLEIGH
- 5. THE WAVELENGTH WITHTHE HIGHEST SCATTERING RATE IS AROUND THE VISIBLE SPECTRUM, MORE PRECISELY AT 418NM THIS SPECIFIC WAVELENGTH IS SEEN BY HUMANS AS THE COLOUR BLUE
- 6. OTHER COLOURS, SUCHAS GREEN, YELLOW AND RED, HAVE PROGRESSIVELY LOWER SCATTERING AND HIGHER ABSORPTION RATES.
- 7. GOING BEYOND THEVISIBLE SPECTRUM, INTO SHORTWAVE ULTRAVIOLET OR LONGWAVE INFRARED, ABSORPTION RATES ARE 10,000,000 TIMES HIGHER. THE OCEAN’S SURFACE LAYER IS PRACTICALLY BLOCKING THOSE WAVELENGTHS.
- 8. YOU MAY WONDERWHY WATER IS TINT-FREE IN OUR EVERYDAY LIVES? THE REASON IS THAT RAYLEIGH SCATTERING NEEDS LARGER QUANTITIES TO BECOME EVIDENT. THE MORE WATER IS ADDED, THE BLUER IT WILL LOOK.
- 9. CURIOUSLY, AN OCEANOF THE SAME CHEMICAL COMPOSITION AS ON EARTH, BUT LOCATED ON SOME FAR-AWAY PLANET CAN BE A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT COLOUR, SUCH AS VIOLET.
- 10. WE (SADLY!) DONOT HAVE VIOLET OCEANS BECAUSE: 1. HUMAN EYES AREN’T GREAT AT DETECTING VIOLET 2. IT FORMS ONLY A MINOR PART OF OUR SUN’S SPECTRUM 3. IT CAN BE ABSORBED BY THE OZONE LAYER
- 11. WHY IS THEOCEAN BLUE? WELL, SOMETIMES IT ISN’T!
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- 15. WATER ON EARTHOFTEN DEFIES CONVENTION, TURNING DIFFERENT COLOURS – AND IT’S USUALLY ALGAE TO BLAME.
- 16. THE END TEXTFROM TWINSTAR.ORG
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