Q.Out of red, blue and yellow lights, the scattering of ___________ light is maximum.
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Start your 14-day free trial to unlock the full solution →The scattering of light is inversely proportional to the fourth power of its wavelength. Blue light has the shortest wavelength among red, blue, and yellow, so its scattering is maximum.
The key to this question lies in understanding Rayleigh scattering — the phenomenon that explains why the sky is blue and why sunsets appear red. When light travels through a medium (like air), it interacts with particles much smaller than its wavelength. The amount of scattering depends strongly on the wavelength of the light.
For Rayleigh scattering, the intensity of scattered light is proportional to , where is the wavelength of light.
This means shorter wavelengths scatter much more than longer ones. Let's apply this to the three colours given.
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Recall the approximate wavelengths of the three colours in the visible spectrum:
- Red light: longest wavelength, roughly
- Yellow light: intermediate, roughly
- Blue light: shortest wavelength, roughly
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Apply the rule: Since scattering intensity is inversely proportional to the fourth power of wavelength, even a small difference in wavelength leads to a large difference in scattering. Blue, having the smallest , will scatter the most. Red, with the largest , scatters the least. Yellow falls in between. …
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