Computer scientists at UC San Diego, by employing an advanced simulation method based on the interference of light with different sizes and shapes of water drops, have restructured the wide variety of rainbows into primary, secondary rainbows, and cloudbows that appear on foggy days and redbows at sunset, with practical simulations to explain even complex twinned rainbows that bilaterally divide their primary bow.
Jensen, Sadeghi and colleagues began assuming the rainbows to identify the interaction of circular water drops with light, which resulted in brilliant, colorful arcs that appear after the rain or in humid, tropical weather. Although this method failed to explain its reaction with twinned rainbows, more research were carried out to assume that air pressure flattens the bottom of water drops when it is being dropped giving it a burger like appearance, which was named burgeroids, that helped the researchers to imitate a wide range of rainbows found in nature.
According to Sadeghi, a beam of light is being refracted and reflected inside the water drop, with an increased concentration near the rainbow angle, varying according to the color of light within the drop. The resulting sunlight splits into its spectral components, which appears as colors in the sky. The divergence in the emergence of rainbows is based on the shapes and sizes of rain drops.
Laven, Sadeghi, and Jensen along with their co-workers are intended to present their investigation at the SIGGRAPH conference to be held at Los Angeles in 2012.
Source: http://www.ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/