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Astronomy & Space vocabulary · Telescopes & Observation

Light pollution

Meaning in astronomy & space, with examples

nounCommon term

In astronomy & space, light pollution means: Too much artificial light at night from streetlights, buildings and signs, which brightens the sky and hides faint stars and galaxies.

In Turkish: ışık kirliliği

How it is used

A big topic for stargazers, astrophotographers and environmental groups. People escape, measure and reduce light pollution and look for 'dark sky' sites. The Bortle scale rates sky darkness from 1 (darkest) to 9 (inner city).

Example sentences

  1. Because of light pollution, many city children have never seen the Milky Way.

  2. We drove two hours away from the city to escape the light pollution.

Common collocations

  • reduce light pollution
  • light pollution map
  • heavy light pollution
  • escape light pollution
  • dark sky site
  • observatoryA building or site with telescopes and instruments for observing the sky. Many large observatories are built on high, dry mountains far from city lights.
  • Milky WayThe barred spiral galaxy that contains our solar system and a few hundred billion stars. It also names the pale band of light it forms across a dark night sky.
  • magnitudeA number that measures how bright a star or other object looks. The scale runs backwards: the lower the number, the brighter the object, and very bright objects have negative values.
  • telescopeAn instrument that collects light or other radiation from distant objects with lenses, mirrors or antennas, so that faint and far-away things can be seen and studied.

More terms: Telescopes & Observation

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