Light: Heat the Rainbow!
by Nicole D.
8th Grade - Honorable Mention

Question: How does color affect heating by absorption of light?

Hypothesis: This researcher's hypothesis is that black color will absorb the most heat while the white color will absorb the least heat.

Conclusion:

• Black color, as expected, has the steepest slope because it absorbs all light and infrared wavelengths most efficiently.
• Purple and blue colors also have steep slopes because they primarily reflect short wavelengths but absorb the longer wavelengths including infrared light
• Red, orange and yellow colors all absorb short but reflect long wavelengths, including infrared, so their slopes are not very steep
• Green color has intermediate slope because it is in the middle of the visible light and absorbs long and infrared wavelengths better than red and orange colors but not as good as blue and
  purple colors
• White color seems to have its slope too large. Because it reflects all wavelengths more efficiently than other colors, its slope was expected to be the smallest. Perhaps inaccurate readings of temperature could be a reason why its slope was not found to be as was expected.