SpectraSnapp

SpectraSnapp turns your iPhone into a hand-held spectroscope.

Use our instructions to build the simple add-on over your iPhone’s camera and point it at anything that glows. The SpectraSnapp app breaks apart the incoming light into its separate wavelengths. You can see how different kinds of light sources all have their own unique signatures. Use the comparison tool in the app to match your spectra sample to a library of common sources, and you can tell what’s generating that light! Astronomers use this same technique to figure out what elements make up distant stars.