Information about the sun

The Sun is a huge ball of incandescent plasma at the center of our Solar System. It accounts for more than 99.86% of the mass of the Solar System, and provides all the energy we need for life here on arth. !ncient civili"ations, such as the #omans worshipped the Sun because they saw it as something that brought life. It was given various names such as Sol by the #omans and $elios by the %ree&s. !nd perhaps that worship was reasonable, for without the Sun, life on arth 'ust wouldn(t be possible. Characteristics of the Sun

The Sun(s diameter is ),*9+,,,, &ilometres or 86-,,,, miles. that(s ),9 times the diameter of the arth. /ou could fit ).* million planets the si"e of the arth into the Sun. verything in the Solar System orbits around the Sun, including 8 planets and their moons, many dwarf planets, asteroids, comets and dust. The mass of the Sun really dwarfs the mass of any other ob'ect in the Solar System. for e0ample, it has ***,,,, times the mass of arth. If the Sun were hollow, you could fit more than one million arths inside of it 1 you could only fit )*,, arths inside of 2upiter. The Life of the Sun The Sun formed 3.6 billion years ago from a vast cloud of gas and dust called the Solar 4ebula. 5ver millions of years, this gas and dust collected into the Sun and the planets. 5nce the Sun(s gravity compressed its hydrogen enough, temperatures in the core reached the point of igniting solar fusion, releasing the energy we feel here on arth. !lthough it(s currently in the main se6uence phase of life, the Sun is slowly heating up. It(s e0pected to last for another 7 billion years or so. 5nce all the usable hydrogen in the core runs out, the Sun will e0pand outward into a red giant, consuming the inner planets 8maybe even arth9. Then it will slough off its outer layers and collapse inward to become a white dwarf star. Color of the Sun The surface of the Sun that we can see is called the photosphere, and it has an average temperature of about -,8,, &elvin. This is the point at which photons generated inside the Sun finally reach the vacuum of space. The Sun(s surface is composed of a number of layers including the photosphere, the chromosphere, and the corona, which are all the outer layers.

Parts of the Sun

Interior of the Sun. Image credit: NASA :ut if you could descend down into the Sun, you would find the temperature and pressure increasing until you reached the core of the Sun. !t the core, the temperature is )-.7 million &elvin and the pressure is sufficient to support nuclear fusion. This is where protons are merged together to form atoms of helium, releasing tremendous amounts of energy. :ecause the Sun is made of plasma, it(s also highly magnetic. It has north and south magnetic poles li&e the arth, and the magnetic field lines create the activity we see on the surface. The dar&er sunspots are created when magnetic field lines pierce through the Sun(s photosphere. ;oronal mass e'ections and solar flares occur when these magnetic field lines snap and reconfigure. The amount of activity on the Sun rises and falls over an ))<year cycle. !t the low point, called solar minimum, there are few, if any sunspots. !nd then at the high point of the cycle, solar ma0imum, there are the most sunspots and the greatest amount of solar activity. The Sun does much more to protect us than 'ust provide heat. It lets off solar winds and material that travels out into space. If we did not have the arth(s magnetic field, then this material would &ill us. $owever, the solar winds carry out the charged material to the edge of the Solar System where it forms a magnetic field that prevents other interplanetary material from getting in. This barrier is &nown as the heliopause and without it the Solar System will be battered by cosmic rays. The heliopause, the boundary between the Sun=s solar wind and the interstellar medium, is the boundary between the Sun=s solar wind .! stream of charged particles, mostly protons and electrons, that escapes into the Sun=s outer atmosphere at high speeds and streams out into the solar system, and the interstellar medium. !ll the gas and dust found between stars.. The solar wind blows a >bubble> &nown as the heliosphere. The region around the Sun where the solar wind dominates over the interstellar medium. Into the interstellar medium. The outer border of this >bubble> is where the solar wind=s strength is no longer great enough to push bac& the interstellar medium. This is &nown as the heliopause, and is often considered to be the outer border of the solar system. The "one between the termination shoc& The boundary mar&ing one of the outer limits of the Sun=s influence. !t the termination shoc&, solar

wind particles slow down as they begin to press into the particles forming the interstellar medium. The solar wind particles then continue to travel outward at a slower rate of speed. This is similar to cars speeding along a highway which then slow down as they encounter many more cars involved in a traffic 'am. The 'ammed cars continue to move outward, although much more slowly. !nd the heliopause is &nown as the heliosheath. The place where the solar wind slows down and begins to interact with the interstellar medium. The heliosheath has a few parts? the termination shoc& 8the innermost part of the boundary9, the heliopause 8the outermost part of the boundary9 and the part in between the inner and outer boundary..

Remove this ad The charged particles carried by solar winds also interfere with satellites, power lines, and other technology on arth as well as causing the aurora borealis. Sunlight is vital to our planet, and it ta&es appro0imately eight minutes for that light to reach arth. It depends on where the arth is in its orbit and how far away it is from the Sun at the time. !lthough our Sun appears to be yellow, it is actually white. It merely appears to be yellow because of the effect of the atmosphere. Scientists used to believe that the Sun was not really that impressive of a star. @ith further studies though, they have come to reali"e that it is brighter than most of the other stars in the gala0y, which are red dwarfs. The Sun ta&es about ) month to rotate once on its a0is. however, this is a rough estimate because the Sun is a ball of plasma. Some parts of the Sun rotate faster than other parts, so it(s hard to say when it has completed a full rotation. The Sun is composed almost entirely of hydrogen 873%9 and helium 8+-%9, with other trace elements. The innermost layer of the Sun is the core, where the nuclear fusion reactions are ta&ing place. 5utside that is the radiative "one, where photons of gamma radiation created in the core are emitted and absorbed by hydrogen atoms. ! single photon can ta&e ),,,,,, years to finally get through the radiative "one. 5utside the radiative "one is the convective "one, where bubbles of plasma rise and fall li&e a lava lamp. The Sun is made up of different layers that actually rotate at different speeds. :ecause the Sun is more similar to a gas giant in that it is high in helium and hydrogen, it also e0periences what is &nown as differential rotation. !t the outer layers, near the e6uator it rotates about once every +-.3 days while near the poles it ta&es up to *6 days to complete one rotation. Sunspots are cooler areas on the surface of the Sun, which last up to a few months and vary greatly in si"e. Sunspots appear in cycles and sometimes

there appear to be none on the Sun at all. Scientists are still trying to learn more about sunspots. 5nly about -% of stars in the Ail&y @ay are larger than the Sun. the vast ma'ority are smaller red dwarf stars. Some of the biggest stars can be ),,,,,, times brighter and contain ),, times more mass. The Sun is also relatively young, a member of the Bopulation I group of stars. 5lder stars, which formed billions of years before the Sun are Bopulation II stars and have less heavier elements in them. The oldest stars are Bopulation III stars, formed 'ust after the :ig :ang, but these are purely theoretical.