Sun

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For the newspaper, see The Sun (newspaper).
The Sun Sun symbol.svgThe Sun by the Atmospheric Imaging Assembly of NASA's Solar
Dynamics Observatory - 20100819.jpg
Observation data
Average distance
from Earth 1.496×108 km
8 min 19 s at light speed
Visual brightness (V) −26.74[1]
True brightness 4.83[1]
Angular size 31.6–32.7′[2]
Adjective Solar
Orbit and rotation
Average distance
from Milky Way center ≈ 2.7×1017 km
27,200 light-years
Velocity ≈ 220 km/s (orbit around the center of the Milky Way)
≈ 20 km/s (relative to average velocity of other stars nearby)
≈ 370 km/s[3] (relative to the cosmic microwave background)
Obliquity 7.25°[1]
(to the ecliptic)
67.23°
(to the galactic plane)
Rotation velocity 7.189×103 km/h[4]
Physical characteristics
Equatorial radius 696,342±65 km[5]
109 × Earth[4]
Equatorial circumference 4.379×106 km[4]
109 × Earth[4]
Flattening 9×10−6
Surface area 6.09×1012 km2[4]
12,000 × Earth[4]
Volume 1.41×1018 km3[4]
1,300,000 × Earth
Mass (1.98855±0.00025)×1030 kg[1]
333,000 × Earth[1]
Average density 1.408 g/cm3[1][4][6]
0.255 × Earth[1][4]
Surface gravity 274.0 m/s2[1]
27.94 g
27,542.29 cgs
28 × Earth[4]
Escape velocity
(from the surface) 617.7 km/s[4]
55 × Earth[4]
Temperature Center: 1.57×107 K[1]
Photosphere: 5,778 K[1]
Corona: ≈ 5×106 K
Luminosity (Lsol) 3.846×1026 W[1]
Age ≈4.6 billion years[7][8]
The Sun as it is seen from Earth

The Sun in the center of our solar system is a yellow dwarf star. It gives off
energy as light. That includes light, infra-red energy (heat), ultraviolet light
and radio waves. It also gives off a stream of particles, which reaches Earth as
"solar wind". The source of all this energy is the reaction in the star which turns
hydrogen into helium and makes huge amounts of energy.

The Sun is a star like many others in our Milky Way galaxy. It has existed for a
little over 4.5 billion years, and is going to continue for at least as long. The
Sun is about a hundred times as wide as the Earth. It has a mass of 1.9891×1030 kg,
which is 333,000 times the mass of the Earth. The Earth can also fit inside the Sun
1.3 million times.
Contents

1 Physics of the Sun

1.1 Origin
1.2 How it works
2 Orbit
3 Visible features
3.1 Photosphere
4 Atmosphere
5 Eclipses
6 Fate of the Sun
7 More reading
8 References

Physics of the Sun

Origin

Scientists think that the Sun started from a very large cloud of dust and small
bits of ice about 4.567 billion years ago.[9]

At the center of that huge cloud, gravity caused the material to build up into a
ball. Once this got big enough, the huge pressure inside started a fusion reaction.
The energy this released caused that ball to heat and shine.

The energy radiated from the Sun pushed away the rest of the cloud from itself, and
the planets formed from the rest of this cloud.
How it works

At its very center, hydrogen atoms collide together at great temperature and
pressure so that they fuse to form atoms of helium. This process is called nuclear
fusion.

The sun can also be used as a source of solar energy.

Orbit

The sun and everything that orbits it is located in the Milky Way. As the sun
orbits it takes everything in the solar system. The sun moves at 820,000 km an
hour. At that speed its still 230 million years for a full orbit.
Visible features

Since the Sun is all gas, surface features come and go. If the Sun is viewed
through a special solar telescope, dark areas called sunspots can be seen. These
areas are caused by the Sun's magnetic field. The sunspots only look dark because
the rest of the Sun is very bright.

Some space telescopes, including the ones that orbit the Sun have seen huge arches
of the Sun's matter extend suddenly from the Sun. These are called solar
prominences. Solar prominences come in many different shapes and sizes. Some of
them are so large that the Earth could fit inside of them, and a few are shaped
like hands. Solar flares also come and go.

Sunspots, prominences and flares become rare, and then numerous, and then rare
again, every 11 years.
Photosphere

This is the surface of the Sun. The light that the Earth receives from the Sun is
radiated from this layer. Below this layer, the Sun is opaque, or not transparent
to light.
Atmosphere

Five layers make up the atmosphere of the Sun. The chromosphere, transition region,
and corona are much hotter than the outer photosphere surface of the Sun.[10] It is
believed that Alfvén waves may pass through to heat the corona.[11]

The minimum temperature zone, the coolest layer of the Sun, is about 500 km above
the photosphere. It has a temperature of about 4100 K.[10] This part of the Sun is
cool enough to allow simple molecules such as carbon monoxide and water to form.
These molecules can be seen on the Sun with special instruments called
spectroscopes.[12]

The chromosphere is the first layer of the Sun which can be seen, especially during
a solar eclipse when the moon is covering most of the Sun and blocking the
brightest light.

The solar transition region is the part of the Sun's atmosphere, between the
chromosphere and outer part called the corona.[13] It can be seen from space using
telescopes that can sense ultraviolet light. The transition is between two very
different layers. In the bottom part it touches the photosphere and gravity shapes
the features. At the top, the transition layer touches the corona.

The corona is the outer atmosphere of the Sun and is much bigger than the rest of
the Sun. The corona continuously expands into space forming the solar wind, which
fills all the Solar System.[14] The average temperature of the corona and solar
wind is about 1,000,000–2,000,000 K. In the hottest regions it is 8,000,000–
20,000,000 K.[15] We do not understand why the corona is so hot.[14][15] It can be
seen during a solar eclipse or with an instrument called a coronagraph.

The heliosphere is the thin outer atmosphere of the Sun, filled with the solar wind
plasma. It extends out past the orbit of Pluto to the heliopause, where it forms a
boundary where it collides with the interstellar medium.[16]
Eclipses

A solar eclipse appears when the moon is between the Earth and Sun. The last
partial eclipse seen in Britain was on the 21st of August, 2017.

A lunar eclipse happens when the moon passes through the shadow of the Earth which
can only occur during a full moon.The number of lunar eclipses in a single year can
range from 0 to 3. Partial eclipses slightly outnumber total eclipses by 7 to 6.
[17]
Fate of the Sun

Astrophysicists say our Sun is a G-type main-sequence star in the middle of its
life. In a billion years or so, increased solar energy will boil away the Earth's
atmosphere and oceans. In a few more billion years, they think the Sun will get
bigger and become a red giant star. The Sun would be up to 250 times its current
size, as big as 1.4 AU and will swallow up the earth.

Earth's fate is still a bit of a mystery. In the long term, the Earth's future
depends on the Sun, and the Sun is going to be fairly stable for the next 5 billion
years.[18][19] Calculations suggest that the Earth might move to a wider orbit.
This is because about 30% of the Sun's mass will blow away in the solar wind.
However, in the very long term the Earth will probably be destroyed as the Sun
increases in size. Stars like the Sun become red giants at a later stage.[20] The
Sun will expand beyond orbits of Mercury, Venus, and probably Earth. In any event,
the ocean and air would have vanished before the Sun gets to that stage.

After the Sun reaches a point where it can no longer get bigger, it will lose its
layers and form a planetary nebula. Eventually, the Sun will shrink into a white
dwarf. Then, over several hundred billion or even a trillion years, the Sun would
fade into a black dwarf.
More reading
Lang, Kenneth R. (2001). The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the Sun. Cambridge
University Press. ISBN 9780521780933.