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Jeremiah Walgren
General Operations Director
Know-It-All
Joined: 24 May 2003
Posts: 1937
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 Posted: 07 Dec 2005 07:47:46 pm Post subject: |
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A friend of mine who is majoring in Chemistry asked me an interesting question that I really could not answer. It dealt with the reflection of light from ice and snow.
If you look at a normal piece of ice (for lack of a better phrase) it's basically transparent. You can pretty much see through it. However, when one looks at snow, it is white. Why the difference? I mean, they're both frozen water when you simplify it enough.
Any thoughts on the matter would be appreciated. |
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Liazon
title goes here
Bandwidth Hog
Joined: 01 Nov 2005
Posts: 2007
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| Posted: 07 Dec 2005 10:45:06 pm Post subject: |
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Perhaps snow is not as compact, so you still have air molecules stuck between all the snow particles. It is possible that this combination of molecules does not allow light to pass through the same way, causing light to be reflected completely back at the viewer, as opposed to just passing through both ways.
I'm no chem major though, I just started hs chem :biggrin: though this seems plausible to me. |
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thornahawk
μολών λαβέ
Active Member
Joined: 27 Mar 2005
Posts: 569
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| Posted: 07 Dec 2005 10:52:55 pm Post subject: |
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I'd write a detailed explanation, but pointing you to here would spare me the effort. :)
thornahawk |
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Liazon
title goes here
Bandwidth Hog
Joined: 01 Nov 2005
Posts: 2007
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| Posted: 07 Dec 2005 11:05:31 pm Post subject: |
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So I was close. Basically, ice's pefectly crystalline structure has places where at certain angles, light can pass through untouched. At other angles, light is reflected either on the way in or on the way out. That's why sometimes ice and glass will reflect like a mirror instead of being entirely see through. Think of it this way.
Ctrl-A this.
[font="courier new"]_________\__/
_\ _ _ _ _\/_ _ _ _ _
__\
__ \ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
____\
That's a horrible diagram, but I hope it gets my point across.
edit: can somebody help out with this diagram?
edit2: Thanks a whole ton weregoose!
Last edited by Guest on 08 Dec 2005 12:10:08 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Ray Kremer
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Joined: 16 Feb 2004
Posts: 237
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| Posted: 12 Dec 2005 12:31:15 pm Post subject: |
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Yep, it's light scattering.
Jeremiah Walgren wrote: I mean, they're both frozen water when you simplify it enough.
[post="63615"]<{POST_SNAPBACK}>[/post]
That doesn't mean much. Structure is what's important. Diamonds and graphite are both pure carbon. Sand and glass are both silicon dioxide. |
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Liazon
title goes here
Bandwidth Hog
Joined: 01 Nov 2005
Posts: 2007
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| Posted: 12 Dec 2005 04:42:06 pm Post subject: |
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| Like is said, in snow, there's more oxygen trapped in between the ice particles. There's no "nothingness" for the light to pass through scott free in both directions. |
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