Refraction

[s. 1] Refractive atmosphere: this Power Refractive atmosphere: this Power, effect (-pow'ur.) is called terrestrial [Samederiv.] R. (Phys.) The degree to which a diaphonous body deflects a ray of light which intersects it. For the measure of this influence, modern writers generally adopt the square of the index of refraction made le by unity, or n2-1, where n indicates the principal index of refraction. [s. 1]