The phenomenon of light changing its direction when going from one transparent medium to another transparent medium is known as the refraction of light. The velocity of light rays of all frequencies is the same. The velocity of light in a medium is dependent on the frequency of light and thus, different colours travel with different velocity. Hence, the refractive index of a medium is different for different colours. Thus, even when white light enters a single medium like glass, the angles of refraction are different for different colours. For this reason, when the white light coming from the Sun through air enters any refracting medium, it emerges as a spectrum of seven colours. So, dispersion of light is the process of separation of light into its component colours while passing through a medium.
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