Why is the sky blue? The sky is blue because molecules in the air scatter the sun's blue light. The white light of the sun is a mixture of all the colors of the rainbow. Mr Issac in Newton used a prism to separate colors and also form a spectrum. The colors of light differ due to the different wavelength. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essayThe visible part of the spectrum ranges from red light with a wavelength of about 720 nm, to violet with a wavelength of about 380 nm, with orange, yellow, green, blue, and indigo in between. The three different types of color receptors in the retina of the human eye respond most strongly to red, green, and blue wavelengths, giving us our color vision. The first steps to correctly explain why the sky is actually blue were taken by John Tyndall in 1859. He was the first to discover that light passes through a clear fluid that holds small particles in suspension. Tyndall's discovery is correctly called the Tyndall effect but is more commonly known to physicists as Rayleigh scattering; by Lord Rayleigh, who studied it in more detail a few years later. He demonstrated that the amount of scattered light is inversely proportional to the fourth power of the wavelength for sufficiently small particles. It follows that blue light is scattered more than red light by a factor of (700/400)4 = 10. Tyndall or Rayleigh thought that the blue color in the sky was due to small dust particles and droplets of water vapor in the atmosphere. The case was finally solved by Einstein in 1911, who calculated the detailed formula for the scattering of light by molecules; and this proved to be in agreement with the experiment. He even managed to use the calculation as a further check of Avogadro's number against observation. Molecules are able to scatter light because the electromagnetic field of light waves induces electric dipole moments in the molecules. Please note: this is just an example. Get a custom paper from our expert writers now. Get a Custom Essay If shorter wavelengths are scattered more strongly, then it is difficult to explain why the sky does not appear purple, the color with the shortest visible wavelength. The spectrum of the sun's light output is not constant at all wavelengths and is also absorbed by the upper atmosphere, so there is less violet in the light. Works Cited Martin, A. (2017). Why is the sky blue? National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Retrieved from https://spaceplace.nasa.gov/blue-sky/Khanna, P. (2003). Why is the sky blue? American scientist. Retrieved from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/why-is-the-sky-blue/Tyndall, J. (1870). On the blue color of the sky, on the polarization of sky light and on the polarization of light by cloudy matter in general. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, 160, 1-66. doi: 10.1098/rstl.1870.0001 Rayleigh, L. (1899). On the scattering of light by small particles. Philosophical Journal, 47(287), 375-384. doi: 10.1080/14786449908621276 Einstein, A. (1911). On the influence of gravitation on the propagation of light. Annalen der Physik, 340(10), 898-908. doi: 10.1002/andp.19113401005Boas, M. L. (2001). Isaac Newton: adventurer in thought. Cambridge University Press.Freistetter, F. (2016). Why is the sky blue? It's not for the reason you think. Discover the magazine. Retrieved from https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/why-is-the-sky-blue-its-not-for-the-reason-you-thinkTropf, H. H. (1955). Experiments on Newton's prism and hypothesis of light dispersion. The British Journal for the.1922.0078