                        Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
      fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
                    written by a professional astronomer.

                                2020 June 26

                          Eclipse under the Bamboo
    Image Credit & Copyright: Somak Raychaudhury (Inter-University Centre
                        for Astronomy & Astrophysics)

   Explanation: Want to watch a solar eclipse safely? Try looking down
   instead of up, though you might discover you have a plethora of images
   to choose from. For example, during the June 21st solar eclipse this
   confusing display appeared under a shady bamboo grove in Pune, India.
   Small gaps between close knit leaves on the tall plants effectively
   created a network of randomly placed pinholes. Each one projected a
   separate image of the eclipsed Sun. The snapshot was taken close to the
   time of maximum eclipse in Pune when the Moon covered about 60 percent
   of the Sun's diameter. But an annular eclipse, the Moon in silhouette
   completely surrounded by a bright solar disk at maximum, could be seen
   along a narrow path where the Moon's dark shadow crossed central
   Africa, south Asia, and China.

      Gallery: Notable images of the Annular Solar Eclipse of 2020 June
                              submitted to APOD
                     Tomorrow's picture: pixels in space
     __________________________________________________________________

       Authors & editors: Robert Nemiroff (MTU) & Jerry Bonnell (UMCP)
            NASA Official: Phillip Newman Specific rights apply.
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                             & Michigan Tech. U.

