Zodiacal light
The zodiacal light (also called false dawn[2][3][4][5] when seen before sunrise) is a faint glow of diffuse sunlight scattered by interplanetary dust.
A related phenomenon is gegenschein (or counterglow), sunlight backscattered from the interplanetary dust, which appears directly opposite to the Sun as a faint but slightly brighter oval glow.
[9][10] The Pioneer 10 and Helios spacecraft observations in the 1970s revealed zodiacal light to be scattered by the interplanetary dust cloud in the Solar System.
[23] Data from the Juno mission indicate that the dust close to Earth has a local origin in the inner Solar System, best fitting the planet Mars as a source.
The material producing the zodiacal light is located in a lens-shaped volume of space centered on the sun and extending well out beyond the orbit of Earth.
If so, they pointed out, this comet dust can survive entry in partially molten form, accounting for the unusual attributes of the micrometeorites collected in Antarctica, which do not resemble the larger meteorites known to originate from asteroids.
In recent years, observations by a variety of spacecraft have shown significant structure in the zodiacal light including dust bands associated with debris from particular asteroid families and several cometary trails.
[26][27] Other sources state that it was first explained this way by Nicolas Fatio de Duillier, in 1684,[28] whom Cassini advised to study the zodiacal light.
[25] The Islamic prophet Muhammad described zodiacal light in reference to the timing of the five daily prayers, calling it the "false dawn" (الفجر الكاذب al-fajr al-kādhib).
Practitioners of Islam use Muhammad's descriptions of zodiacal light to avoid errors in determining the timing of fasting and daily prayers.
[29][30][31] In 2007, Brian May, lead guitarist with the band Queen, completed his thesis, A Survey of Radial Velocities in the Zodiacal Dust Cloud, thirty-six years after abandoning it to pursue a career in music.
