structural:expansion
Measuring extinction towards an object

To measure the extinction curve for a star, the star's spectrum is compared to the observed spectrum of a similar star known not to be affected by extinction (unreddened). It is also possible to use a theoretical spectrum instead of the observed spectrum for the comparison, but this is less common. In the case of emission nebulae, it is common to look at the ratio of two emission lines which should not be affected by the temperature and density in the nebula. For example, the ratio of hydrogen-alpha to hydrogen-beta emission is always around 2.85 under a wide range of conditions prevailing in nebulae. A ratio other than 2.85 must therefore be due to extinction, and the amount of extinction can thus be calculated.