2012-10-14 09-02-47 Portugal Lisboa Campolide

Sunrise (or sunup) is the moment when the upper rim of the Sun appears on the

horizon The horizon is the apparent line that separates the surface of a celestial body from its sky when viewed from the perspective of an observer on or near the surface of the relevant body. This line divides all viewing directions based on whether i ...

in the

morning Morning is the period from sunrise to noon. There are no exact times for when morning begins (also true of evening and night) because it can vary according to one's lifestyle and the hours of daylight at each time of year. However, morning s ...

. The term can also refer to the entire process of the solar disk crossing the horizon and its accompanying atmospheric effects.

Terminology

Although the Sun appears to "rise" from the horizon, it is actually the ''Earth's'' motion that causes the Sun to appear. The illusion of a moving Sun results from Earth observers being in a

rotating reference frame A rotating frame of reference is a special case of a non-inertial reference frame that is rotating relative to an inertial reference frame. An everyday example of a rotating reference frame is the surface of the Earth. (This article considers only ...

; this apparent motion is so convincing that many cultures had mythologies and religions built around the geocentric model, which prevailed until astronomer

Nicolaus Copernicus Nicolaus Copernicus (; pl, Mikołaj Kopernik; gml, Niklas Koppernigk, german: Nikolaus Kopernikus; 19 February 1473 – 24 May 1543) was a Renaissance polymath, active as a mathematician, astronomer, and Catholic canon, who formulat ...

formulated his

heliocentric Heliocentrism (also known as the Heliocentric model) is the astronomical model in which the Earth and planets revolve around the Sun at the center of the universe. Historically, heliocentrism was opposed to geocentrism, which placed the Earth ...

model in the 16th century. Architect

Buckminster Fuller Richard Buckminster Fuller (; July 12, 1895 – July 1, 1983) was an American architect, systems theorist, writer, designer, inventor, philosopher, and futurist. He styled his name as R. Buckminster Fuller in his writings, publishing ...

proposed the terms "sunsight" and "sunclipse" to better represent the heliocentric model, though the terms have not entered into common language. Astronomically, sunrise occurs for only an instant: the moment at which the upper limb of the Sun appears tangent to the horizon. However, the term ''sunrise'' commonly refers to periods of time both before and after this point: *

Twilight Twilight is light produced by sunlight scattering in the upper atmosphere, when the Sun is below the horizon, which illuminates the lower atmosphere and the Earth's surface. The word twilight can also refer to the periods of time when this i ...

, the period in the morning during which the sky is brightening, but the Sun is not yet visible. The beginning of morning twilight is called ''astronomical

dawn Dawn is the time that marks the beginning of twilight before sunrise. It is recognized by the appearance of indirect sunlight being scattered in Earth's atmosphere, when the centre of the Sun's disc has reached 18° below the observer's ...

''. *The period after the Sun rises during which striking colors and atmospheric effects are still seen.

Measurement

Angle with respect to horizon

The stage of sunrise known as

false sunrise A false sunrise is any of several atmospheric optical phenomena in which the Sun appears to have risen, but is actually still some distance below the horizon. A number of different atmospheric conditions can be responsible for this effect, all ...

actually occurs ''before'' the Sun truly reaches the horizon because

Earth's atmosphere The atmosphere of Earth is the layer of gases, known collectively as air, retained by Earth's gravity that surrounds the planet and forms its planetary atmosphere. The atmosphere of Earth protects life on Earth by creating pressure allowing fo ...

refracts In physics, refraction is the redirection of a wave as it passes from one medium to another. The redirection can be caused by the wave's change in speed or by a change in the medium. Refraction of light is the most commonly observed phenomeno ...

the Sun's image. At the horizon, the average amount of refraction is 34 arcminutes, though this amount varies based on atmospheric conditions. Also, unlike most other solar measurements, sunrise occurs when the Sun's ''upper limb'', rather than its center, appears to cross the horizon. The apparent radius of the Sun at the horizon is 16 arcminutes. These two angles combine to define sunrise to occur when the Sun's center is 50 arcminutes below the horizon, or 90.83° from the

zenith The zenith (, ) is an imaginary point directly "above" a particular location, on the celestial sphere. "Above" means in the vertical direction ( plumb line) opposite to the gravity direction at that location ( nadir). The zenith is the "high ...

Time of day

The timing of sunrise varies throughout the year and is also affected by the viewer's latitude and longitude,

altitude Altitude or height (also sometimes known as depth) is a distance measurement, usually in the vertical or "up" direction, between a reference datum and a point or object. The exact definition and reference datum varies according to the context ...

, and

time zone A time zone is an area which observes a uniform standard time for legal, commercial and social purposes. Time zones tend to follow the boundaries between countries and their subdivisions instead of strictly following longitude, because it ...

. These changes are driven by the

axial tilt In astronomy, axial tilt, also known as obliquity, is the angle between an object's rotational axis and its orbital axis, which is the line perpendicular to its orbital plane; equivalently, it is the angle between its equatorial plane and orb ...

of Earth, daily rotation of the Earth, the planet's movement in its annual elliptical orbit around the Sun, and the Earth and Moon's paired revolutions around each other. The

analemma In astronomy, an analemma (; ) is a diagram showing the position of the Sun in the sky as seen from a fixed location on Earth at the same mean solar time, as that position varies over the course of a year. The diagram will resemble a figur ...

can be used to make approximate predictions of the time of sunrise. In late winter and spring, sunrise as seen from temperate latitudes occurs earlier each day, reaching its earliest time near the

summer solstice The summer solstice, also called the estival solstice or midsummer, occurs when one of Earth's poles has its maximum tilt toward the Sun. It happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere (Northern and Southern). For that hemisphere, the summer ...

; although the exact date varies by latitude. After this point, the time of sunrise gets later each day, reaching its latest sometime around the

winter solstice The winter solstice, also called the hibernal solstice, occurs when either of Earth's poles reaches its maximum tilt away from the Sun. This happens twice yearly, once in each hemisphere (Northern and Southern). For that hemisphere, the winter ...

. The offset between the dates of the solstice and the earliest or latest sunrise time is caused by the eccentricity of Earth's orbit and the tilt of its axis, and is described by the

, which can be used to predict the dates. Variations in atmospheric refraction can alter the time of sunrise by changing its apparent position. Near the poles, the time-of-day variation is exaggerated, since the Sun crosses the horizon at a very shallow angle and thus rises more slowly. Accounting for atmospheric refraction and measuring from the leading edge slightly increases the average duration of

day A day is the time period of a full rotation of the Earth with respect to the Sun. On average, this is 24 hours, 1440 minutes, or 86,400 seconds. In everyday life, the word "day" often refers to a solar day, which is the length between two ...

relative to

night Night (also described as night time, unconventionally spelled as "nite") is the period of ambient darkness from sunset to sunrise during each 24-hour day, when the Sun is below the horizon. The exact time when night begins and ends depends ...

. The

sunrise equation The sunrise equation or sunset equation can be used to derive the time of sunrise or sunset for any solar declination and latitude in terms of local solar time when sunrise and sunset actually occur. Formulation It is formulated as: :\cos \ ...

, however, which is used to derive the time of sunrise and sunset, uses the Sun's physical center for calculation, neglecting atmospheric refraction and the non-zero angle subtended by the solar disc.

Location on the horizon

Neglecting the effects of refraction and the Sun's non-zero size, whenever sunrise occurs, in temperate regions it is always in the northeast quadrant from the March equinox to the September equinox and in the southeast quadrant from the September equinox to the March equinox. Sunrises occur approximately due east on the March and September equinoxes for all viewers on Earth. Exact calculations of the

azimuth An azimuth (; from ar, اَلسُّمُوت, as-sumūt, the directions) is an angular measurement in a spherical coordinate system. More specifically, it is the horizontal angle from a cardinal direction, most commonly north. Mathematical ...

s of sunrise on other dates are complex, but they can be estimated with reasonable accuracy by using the

. The figure on the right is calculated using the solar geometry routine in Ref.Zhang, T., Stackhouse, P.W., Macpherson, B., and Mikovitz, J.C., 2021. A solar azimuth formula that renders circumstantial treatment unnecessary without compromising mathematical rigor: Mathematical setup, application and extension of a formula based on the subsolar point and atan2 function. ''Renewable Energy'', 172, 1333-1340. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2021.03.047 as follows: 1.) For a given latitude and a given date, calculate the declination of the Sun using

0^

longitude and solar noon time as inputs to the routine; 2.) Calculate the sunrise hour angle using the

; 3.) Calculate the sunrise time, which is the solar noon time minus the sunrise hour angle in degree divided by 15; 4.) Use the sunrise time as input to the solar geometry routine to get the solar azimuth angle at sunrise.

Hemispheric symmetry

An interesting feature in the figure on the right is apparent hemispheric symmetry in regions where daily sunrise and sunset actually occur. This symmetry becomes clear if the hemispheric relation in

is applied to the x- and y-components of the solar vector presented in Ref.

Appearance

Colors

Air molecules and airborne particles scatter white sunlight as it passes through the Earth's atmosphere. This is done by a combination of Rayleigh scattering and

Mie scattering The Mie solution to Maxwell's equations (also known as the Lorenz–Mie solution, the Lorenz–Mie–Debye solution or Mie scattering) describes the scattering of an electromagnetic plane wave by a homogeneous sphere. The solution takes the ...

. As a ray of white sunlight travels through the atmosphere to an observer, some of the colors are scattered out of the beam by air molecules and airborne particles, changing the final color of the beam the viewer sees. Because the shorter wavelength components, such as blue and green, scatter more strongly, these colors are preferentially removed from the beam. At sunrise and sunset, when the path through the atmosphere is longer, the blue and green components are removed almost completely leaving the longer wavelength orange and red hues seen at those times. The remaining reddened sunlight can then be scattered by cloud droplets and other relatively large particles to light up the horizon red and orange. The removal of the shorter wavelengths of light is due to Rayleigh scattering by air molecules and particles much smaller than the wavelength of visible light (less than 50 nm in diameter).Craig Bohren (ed.), ''Selected Papers on Scattering in the Atmosphere'', SPIE Optical Engineering Press, Bellingham, WA, 1989 The scattering by cloud droplets and other particles with diameters comparable to or larger than the sunlight's wavelengths (more than 600 nm) is due to

and is not strongly wavelength-dependent. Mie scattering is responsible for the light scattered by clouds, and also for the daytime halo of white light around the Sun (

forward scattering In physics, telecommunications, and astronomy, forward scatter is the deflection—by diffraction, nonhomogeneous refraction, or nonspecular reflection by particulate matter of dimensions that are large with respect to the wavelength in question ...

of white light). Sunset colors are typically more brilliant than sunrise colors, because the evening air contains more particles than morning air. Ash from volcanic eruptions, trapped within the

troposphere The troposphere is the first and lowest layer of the atmosphere of the Earth, and contains 75% of the total mass of the planetary atmosphere, 99% of the total mass of water vapour and aerosols, and is where most weather phenomena occur. Fro ...

, tends to mute sunset and sunrise colors, while volcanic ejecta that is instead lofted into the

stratosphere The stratosphere () is the second layer of the atmosphere of the Earth, located above the troposphere and below the mesosphere. The stratosphere is an atmospheric layer composed of stratified temperature layers, with the warm layers of air h ...

(as thin clouds of tiny sulfuric acid droplets), can yield beautiful post-sunset colors called afterglows and pre-sunrise glows. A number of eruptions, including those of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 and Krakatoa in 1883, have produced sufficiently high stratospheric sulfuric acid clouds to yield remarkable sunset afterglows (and pre-sunrise glows) around the world. The high altitude clouds serve to reflect strongly reddened sunlight still striking the stratosphere after sunset, down to the surface.

Optical illusions and other phenomena

Atmospheric refraction Atmospheric refraction is the deviation of light or other electromagnetic wave from a straight line as it passes through the atmosphere due to the variation in air density as a function of height. This refraction is due to the velocity of ligh ...

causes the Sun to be seen while it is still below the horizon. * Light from the lower edge of the Sun's disk is refracted more than light from the upper edge. This reduces the apparent height of the Sun when it appears just above the horizon. The width is not affected, so the Sun appears wider than it is high. *The Sun appears larger at sunrise than it does while higher in the sky, in a manner similar to the Moon illusion. *The Sun appears to rise above the horizon and circle the Earth, but it is actually the Earth that is rotating, with the Sun remaining fixed. This effect results from the fact that an observer on Earth is in a

. *Occasionally a ''

'' occurs, demonstrating a very particular kind of Parhelion belonging to the optical phenomenon family of halos. *Sometimes just before sunrise or after sunset a green flash can be seen. This is an optical phenomenon in which a green spot is visible above the Sun, usually for no more than a second or two.

References

External links

Full physical explanation of sky color, in simple terms

An Excel workbook
with VBA functions for sunrise, sunset, solar noon, twilight (dawn and dusk), and solar position (azimuth and elevation)
Geolocation service to calculate the time of sunrise and sunset

Sunrise Ballooning Luxor
{{Parts of a day Articles containing video clips Daily events Morning Earth phenomena Parts of a day Solar phenomena