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submitted 1 year ago by SnotBubble@lemmy.ml to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

While camping, I noticed that if you look long enough at almost any star, you start seeing some tiny, subtle colors in that star. Even crazier, they sometimes flicker between more colors. In my case orange, blue and something like cyan.

Besides constellations, what else could you observe regarding starts, with the naked eye?

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[-] Uprise42@artemis.camp 6 points 1 year ago

Stars can appear red or blue depending on the direction they are traveling. It has to do with the frequency of light they put out. As they move away the frequency gets lower, which we interpret as red. As they get closer the frequency gets faster which we interpret as blue.

I am not an astronomer or even a casual stargazer. I took a single class in Astronomy in college and this was a neat fact I picked up. I remember next to nothing else from the class other than the fact that you can fit every planet between the earth and moon.

[-] Venutianxspring@lemmy.dbzer0.com 20 points 1 year ago

That isn't really observable to our naked eye though, that's Doppler shift and is the same thing that makes a sound change pit h if it's coming towards you or away from you (think of a siren as a cop car passes you). The Doppler shift, or redshift of stars and other celestial objects is how the expansion of the universe can be observed and measured.

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this post was submitted on 27 Sep 2023
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