The sun surface temperature is 5,500 degrees Celsius, while the Moon surface is only about 121 degrees Celsius, too low to burn most objects.
The magnifying glass can focus on sunlight and the moon. Image: Tijnlp/IFL Science
Usually people can use magnifying glass to focus light from the sun and burn a certain object. The sun is extremely hot. This star’s surface is about 5,500 degrees Celsius. Although it will need a large lens to focus on the earth to the temperature close to that number, you can get enough heat to create fire.
However, the moon is much cooler with surface temperature at the maximum of about 121 degrees Celsius during the day. Fire paper at a heat level is about 250 degrees Celsius, so it is impossible to burn paper with moon light. Thus, people cannot focus the moon light to make something hoter than 121 degrees Celsius. This heat level is too low to burn most objects.
Some ideas that larger lenses can create fire with the moon light because it obtains more light, or focusing on a small area. However, this is not feasible even though the lens is really huge.
In general, there is no way to “stack” light rays. This prevents more light pressing from a certain direction, set a limit of the amount of light that can be directed from a source to a certain goal. Pushing the light rays closer to collect more light, then gather more beams and direct them into the target from different corners.
“All optical systems follow the law of conservation of étendue. prefer.
“In other words, you cannot squeeze the light rays together without making them less parallel, meaning you cannot target them to a distant point,” Munrooe added. The lens cannot make the light from any point brighter, as making the light from a certain brighter direction will violate the rules of étendue.