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Question
Explain briefly what causes the twinkling of stars at night.
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Solution
Stars are very far from us. The light ray coming from a star undergoes successive refractions on entering the earth’s atmosphere and bends towards the normal. Hence, an apparent image of the star is seen. Simultaneously due to the movement of air, the refractive index of layers of atmosphere keeps on changing, i.e., the apparent position of star keeps changing. Thus, the star appears to twinkle.
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