Why is the oceans water blue

By the way, this effect is most prevalent when the particles that do the scattering are smaller than the wavelength of light, as is the case for the nitrogen and oxygen molecules in the atmosphere. When the sun is setting, the light that reaches you has had to go through lots more atmosphere than when the sun is overhead, hence the only color light that is not scattered away is the long wavelength light, the red.

The particles in these materials that are responsible for scattering the light are larger than the wavelength of light. Consequently, all colors of light are scattered by more or less the same amount. Much of the scattering in milk is due to the lipids fat. If you take out the fat, the milk will not scatter as much light; that is probably why skim milk looks the way it does. Already a subscriber? Sign in.

Thanks for reading Scientific American. Create your free account or Sign in to continue. These shorter wavelengths correspond to blue hues, hence why when we look at the sky, we see it as blue. At sunset and sunrise, the angle at which sunlight enters the atmosphere is significantly changed, and most of the blue and green shorter wavelengths of light are scattered even before reaching the lower atmosphere, so we see more of the orange and red colours in the sky.

The ocean is not blue because it reflects the sky, though I believed that up until a few years ago. Water actually appears blue due to its absorption of red light. When light hits water, the water's molecules absorb some of the photons from the light. Everything absorbs at a different wavelength Your green t-shirt absorbs red , and as a result reflects the remaining colours back at a viewer that's why your t-shirt looks green. In shallow bodies of water like a drinking glass light penetrates it completely, as there is not enough water to absorb enough photons, so we see the water as colourless.

This fact is clear if you look at unedited underwater photos that weren't taken with a camera flash or another artificial light source — even the most vibrant of tropical fish look blue.

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