阿联酋上空的日食

2020 February 10

Solar Eclipse over the UAE
Image Credit & Copyright: Joshua Cripps

Explanation: What’s happening behind that camel? A partial eclipse of the Sun. About six and a half weeks ago, the Moon passed completely in front of the Sun as seen from a narrow band on the Earth. Despite (surely) many camels being located in this narrow band, only one found itself stationed between this camera, the distant Moon, and the even more distant Sun. To create this impressive superposition, though, took a well-planned trip to the United Arab Emirates, careful alignments, and accurate timings on the day of the eclipse. Although the resulting featured image shows a partially eclipsed Sun rising, the Moon went on to appear completely engulfed by the Sun in an annular eclipse known as a ring of fire. Forward scattering of sunlight, dominated by quantum mechanical diffraction, gives the camel hair and rope fray an unusual glow. The next solar eclipse is also an annular eclipse and will occur this coming June.

阿联酋上空的日食
影像来源及版权: Joshua Cripps

说明: 这幅美妙的照片记录了大约6.5周前，一匹骆驼沐浴在日偏食霞光之中的景象。日食是月球运动到太阳与地球之间，引起的一种视觉现象，这种现象能在地球上狭长的日食带中被观测到。在这次的日食带中一定还有很多骆驼，然而只有这一头正好位于相机、月球以及更遥远的太阳之间，因此得到了这幅奇妙的照片。为了让相机、骆驼、月球和太阳构成这样一幅令人印象深刻的照片，作者精心策划了本次阿拉伯联合酋长国之旅，对观测地点、当地日食发生时间等都经过了仔细的计算。虽然这幅照片呈现的是日偏食景象，不过在随后太阳逐渐升起的过程中，月球完全走进太阳的光影里，形成了以“火环（金环）”著称的日环食（金环日食）。由于光经过骆驼毛发以及绳子毛边时，产生了衍射，使得骆驼和绳子有了一层不同寻常的亮边。下一次日食还是日环食，将发生在今年的6月。