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Section 4.6 Optical phenomena

In addition to clouds, a number of phenomena such as rainbows, sundogs, and halos are observed in the sky. In general, these optical phenomena can be attributed to the ways in which light interacts with the atmosphere, including

  • scattering: of light in various directions

  • refraction: of light passing through different atmospheric materials

  • reflection: of light off of surfaces (or with droplets)