What's Inside The Sun?
Summary
TLDRThis video explores the Sun's mysteries, revealing its energy source as nuclear fusion of hydrogen into helium. It delves into the Sun's life cycle, the enigma of its hotter corona, and the powerful effects of solar flares on Earth, including the awe-inspiring auroras. The script also humorously considers the hypothetical scenario of slicing the Sun, highlighting the catastrophic consequences for our solar system.
Takeaways
- 🌞 The Sun is a G-type yellow dwarf star, relatively small compared to other stars, with a temperature of 15 million degrees Celsius.
- 🔥 The Sun's energy comes from nuclear fusion, where hydrogen atoms are fused to form helium, a process that will continue for another 4.5 billion years.
- 🌐 The Sun's corona is mysteriously hotter than its surface, with temperatures exceeding 300 times that of the surface, a phenomenon not yet fully understood by scientists.
- 💥 Nanoflares, small solar explosions, occur in the Sun's atmosphere millions of times per second, contributing to the high temperature of the corona.
- 🌌 Solar flares are massive releases of energy from the Sun, affecting Earth's electromagnetic spectrum and classified into X, M, and C classes based on their intensity.
- ❄️ X-class solar flares can cause severe disruptions, including global radio blackouts and interference with communication systems.
- 🌀 M-class flares may cause brief blackouts in polar regions, while C-class flares are usually unnoticeable to Earth.
- 🌌 Auroras, or polar lights, are indirectly caused by solar flares through coronal mass ejections (CMEs) interacting with Earth's atmosphere.
- 🛠️ The thought experiment of slicing the Sun would require tools capable of withstanding its extreme temperature, which do not currently exist.
- ☢️ If the Sun were to be sliced, Earth would be exposed to harmful gamma radiation and experience a drastic drop in temperature, leading to an 'eternal winter'.
- 💥 The loss of a significant portion of the Sun's mass would disrupt the solar system, potentially causing planets to change orbits and collide with each other.
Q & A
What is the primary source of the Sun's energy and heat?
-The primary source of the Sun's energy and heat is nuclear fusion, a process where hydrogen atoms fuse to form helium, releasing energy in the process.
What type of star is the Sun classified as?
-The Sun is classified as a 'G-type' yellow dwarf star, indicating it is relatively small in size compared to other stars and has a yellowish color.
What is the estimated age of the Sun?
-Scientists have estimated the age of the Sun to be around 4.5 billion years old.
What is the temperature of the Sun's core?
-The temperature of the Sun's core is approximately 15 million degrees Celsius (27 million degrees Fahrenheit).
Why is the Sun's corona hotter than its surface?
-The reason behind the Sun's corona being hotter than its surface is still a mystery, but one hypothesis involves 'nanoflares', small explosions in the Sun's atmosphere that release a significant amount of energy.
What are solar flares and how do they affect Earth?
-Solar flares are sudden flashes of increased brightness on the Sun's surface, releasing energy across the electromagnetic spectrum. They can cause radio blackouts, interfere with communications, and affect power grids on Earth.
How are solar flares categorized based on their energy output?
-Solar flares are categorized into three classes based on their energy output: 'X-class flares' which are the most energetic and cause the most significant effects on Earth, 'M-class flares' which are medium-sized, and 'C-class flares' which have the least energy and are usually unnoticeable.
What are the potential consequences of slicing a piece of the Sun?
-Slicing a piece of the Sun would lead to harmful radiation exposure, a deadly drop in Earth's temperature, unpredictable solar activity, and potential disruption of the solar system's orbits, possibly causing massive collisions.
What is the role of the Sun in maintaining the structure of the solar system?
-The Sun, accounting for 99.8 percent of the solar system's mass, keeps all the planets, dwarf planets, asteroids, and other objects in precise orbits, maintaining harmony and stability within the solar system.
How do solar flares contribute to the creation of auroras on Earth?
-Solar flares can produce 'coronal mass ejections' (CMEs), which are combinations of radiation and particles. When these interact with gases in Earth's atmosphere, they excite the gases, leading to the beautiful northern and southern polar lights, or auroras.
What are the different colors of auroras caused by?
-The different colors of auroras are caused by the interaction of CMEs with different gases in Earth's atmosphere. Oxygen produces greenish-yellow or red light, while nitrogen produces blue light.
Outlines
🌞 Understanding the Sun's Energy and Fusion
This paragraph introduces the Sun as the central star of our solar system, responsible for providing heat and maintaining the Earth's position. It delves into the process of nuclear fusion, which is the source of the Sun's energy. The Sun, classified as a G-type yellow dwarf star, is composed mainly of hydrogen and helium gases in a plasma state. Through nuclear fusion, two hydrogen atoms combine to form helium, releasing energy that sustains the Sun's immense heat and light. The Sun is currently in its main sequence stage and will continue fusing hydrogen for another 4.5 billion years before transitioning into a red giant and fusing helium into carbon. The paragraph also touches on the Sun's corona, which is mysteriously hotter than its surface, and the concept of nanoflares as a potential explanation for this phenomenon.
🌌 Solar Flares and Their Impact on Earth
This section discusses the effects of solar flares on Earth, classifying them into three categories based on their energy output: X-class, M-class, and C-class flares. X-class flares, being the most powerful, can cause global radio blackouts and interfere with communication signals, as exemplified by the 1859 Carrington event and the 1989 Quebec blackout. M-class flares may result in brief blackouts in polar regions, while C-class flares typically have negligible effects. The importance of studying solar activities for better prediction and mitigation of these effects is emphasized. Additionally, the paragraph highlights the positive aspect of solar flares, which are responsible for the beautiful auroras seen on Earth when coronal mass ejections interact with the atmosphere.
💥 The Hypothetical Scenario of Slicing the Sun
In this imaginative scenario, the paragraph explores the consequences of slicing a quarter of the Sun. It outlines four major outcomes: harmful gamma radiation exposure due to the exposed solar core, a drastic drop in Earth's temperature leading to an eternal winter, the unpredictable increase in solar activity as the Sun goes through a rebirth phase, and the potential disruption of the entire solar system's orbits, possibly leading to massive collisions and the Earth wandering off into space. The paragraph concludes by emphasizing the importance of keeping such experiments within the realm of imagination due to the catastrophic effects they would have on the solar system.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Sun
💡Nuclear Fusion
💡Solar System
💡Corona
💡Nanoflares
💡Solar Flares
💡Auroras
💡Carrington Event
💡1989 Quebec Blackout
💡Thought Experiment
💡Space Weather
Highlights
The sun is the source of heat and energy that prevents Earth from freezing and maintains the solar system's order.
Nuclear fusion is the process that powers the sun, fusing hydrogen into helium and releasing energy.
The sun is a G-type yellow dwarf star, relatively small and yellowish with a temperature of 15 million degrees Celsius.
Estimated to be 4.5 billion years old, the sun was the first to form in the solar system.
The sun's energy production through nuclear fusion is similar to that used in Earth's nuclear reactors.
The sun is in its main sequence stage and will continue fusing hydrogen for another 4.5 billion years before becoming a red giant.
The sun's corona is a mystery with temperatures hotter than the sun's surface, contrary to typical heat distribution.
Nanoflares, small solar explosions, may explain the high temperatures of the sun's corona.
Solar flares are energetic bursts that can disrupt Earth's electromagnetic spectrum and cause blackouts.
Solar flares are categorized into X, M, and C classes, with X-class flares causing the most significant impacts on Earth.
Historical events like the Carrington event in 1859 demonstrate the potential damage solar flares can cause to Earth's infrastructure.
The 1989 Quebec blackout was linked to a solar flare, illustrating the real-world consequences of solar activity.
Solar flares can also create beautiful auroras when their energy interacts with Earth's atmosphere.
The sun's magnetic field and its activity are crucial for understanding and predicting space weather.
Thought experiment: Slicing the sun would result in harmful radiation, deadly cold, a new sun's birth, and solar system disruption.
The sun's disappearance or engulfing of Earth is a myth; it has 4.5 billion years left before transitioning to a red giant.
The sun's role as the solar system's maestro means any significant change in its mass would lead to chaos in the orbits of celestial bodies.
Transcripts
We all know the sun as the huge ball of fire in the sky that keeps our planet from freezing
and turning into a ball of ice, and keeps the Earth and the rest of the solar system
in its place.
But what gives the sun its mighty energy and heat power?
And what is happening inside of it that keeps its fire burning?
And a question to those with a wild imagination, can we really slice up a piece of the Sun?
And if we miraculously did, what will be the consequences on Earth and the effects on people
and even the whole solar system?
Will anything ever be the same?!
These are some very big questions that we're gonna answer throughout today's video, and
to get to them, we need to get to know the sun on a more basic level first.
Let's get to it.
Let us first start with knowing some basic information about the sun, like we said in
a previous video (put link to your video about sun's history), the sun is a "G-type" yellow
dwarf star which means it's relatively small in size in comparison with other stars and
it's yellowish in colour with a temperature of 15 million degrees Celsius (27 million
degrees Fahrenheit).
The Sun has been around long before the Earth or any other planet, it was the first thing
formed in the solar system, Scientists have estimated the age of the Sun to be around
4.5 billion years old.
But where does the sun get its energy?
What's inside it that's causing it to keep on burning?
That happens due to a process called "nuclear fusion" uhh what?
Let's take a step back and explain.
The Sun (just like all stars) is made up of hot gases so hot in fact that it’s found
in the fourth state of matter; the plasma, and like many other stars, these gases are
hydrogen and helium in the case of the Sun.
Now, in order for the Sun to sustain itself, it constantly fuses each 2 hydrogen atoms
to produce a single helium atom, the fusion process produces energy which keeps the Sun
burning.
And this whole process is called "nuclear fusion"
You might have heard of this process before, because it is the same process used in nuclear
reactors here on Earth.
Now, the sun is at its main sequence stage which means it will continue on fusing hydrogen
into helium for another 4.5 billion years, and then it will go into another stage for
1 billion years and become a "red giant" burning and fusing helium into a higher element which
is carbon.
If you think that the sun is a piece of work by now, I don't blame you, but wait till you
listen to this.
The sun is so full of mysteries and unsolved phenomena, one of these is the sun’s corona
(no not the Virus) the sun's corona is the outermost layer of the sun's atmosphere.
The corona’s mystery resides in its temperature!
Let me explain, imagine you’re around a source of fire, and as you get closer to the
fire, you feel the heat more, and as you move away, you feel the heat less.
Well, that’s not quite what happens around the sun!
Weird, right?!
The outermost layer of the sun’s atmosphere; the corona is actually HOTTER than the surface
of the sun.
the sun’s surface has an overwhelming temperature of 5726.667 degrees Celsius (10,340 degrees
Fahrenheit), while the atmosphere is well beyond 300 times hotter!!!!
The reason behind this abnormal behaviour still puzzles scientists till today, but they
have a couple of ideas as to why it happens.
One of these ideas is what’s called “nanoflares” presented back in the year 2015, scientists
believe that small explosions called nanoflares burst in the sun’s atmosphere in millions
every second, and even though they are “nano” in solar terms, they produce an amount of
energy equivalent to 10 megatons of hydrogen bomb!
These explosions reach a temperature of up to 10 million Kelvins, and they cause the
sun’s atmosphere to heat up like we see in the sun’s corona.
That’s not all that's happening around the sun, the sun is very active, and that's not
unusual for a star, and it has a very strong magnetic field as well.
The lines of this magnetic field could sometimes be twisted on and around itself which helps
store a lot of energy that can sometimes suddenly get released.
An image showing some active regions of the sun.
The release of that energy is what’s called “solar flares” and they cover the whole
electromagnetic spectrum, and are a billion time the energy of the nanoflares we mentioned
earlier.
Solar flares can be very energetic that they heat material up to millions of degrees!!
Scientists classify solar flares into 3 categories: the “X-class flares” which are the major
solar flares that produce a huge amount of energy in the x-ray.
The “M-class flares” which are the medium size flares on the x-ray spectrum, and finally
the “C-class flares” which have the smallest amount of energy.
The energy that the solar flares eject are sent through space till they reach earth and
each class we mentioned have different implications on earth.
“X-class flares” are the biggest and they can cause radio blackouts on earth and around
the whole world as well as interference with radio signals and communications.
Solar flares can also mess with electricity lines causing electricity shortage like what
happened back in the year 1859 in London where a solar flare caused telegraph lines to stop
and burnt telegraph paper.
This incidence is better known as the “Carrington event”
And probably one of the biggest outcomes of solar flares in the modern history here on
earth happened back on March 13 of the year 1989 in Quebec canada, when the whole province
suffered from an electrical blackout of power grids that lasted as long as 12 hours.
The blackout was traced back to an explosion astronomers had observed 3 days earlier on
March 10 on the surface of the sun.
Following the explosion was a release of energy the equivalent of a thousand nuclear bombs
which was traveling to earth’s way at a million miles per hour.
The same solar flare also jammed radio communications, and didn’t only affect Canada, but had its
consequences on power grids in the United States as well.
“The New York Power” lost 150 megawatts of energy and “The New England Power Pool”
lost 1400 megawatts of energy causing 200 power grid problems across the united states
within minutes of the stars of the solar storm.
An image showing solar eruption.
Credit: ESA.
“M-class flares” on the other hand can cause brief blackouts only in the polar regions
of earth, while “C-class flares” are usually unnoticeable to earth.
Scientists say that solar storms causing major blackouts like what happened in Quebec are
rare, but scientists also confess it’s actually a matter of chance and can’t be exactly
known which solar flare will cause blackouts.
So, due to all these unfortunate implications of solar flares and solar activities, it is
crucial for astronomers to keep on studying the sun and understanding more about the solar
activities in order for them to better predict the sun’s space weather.
Because better predictions will ultimately lead us to come up with better solutions to
avert the problems caused by solar flares.
Because nobody would like to lose electricity and internet access for 12 hours in the future!
However, solar flares' effects are not all bad and harmful to Earth, in fact, they're
actually indirectly responsible for some of the most wonderful scenes on Earth, I'm talking
about the Auroras!
Solar flares can produce what's called "coronal mass ejections" (CME) which are a combination
of radiation and particles that interact with gases in Earth's atmosphere and excites them
to a higher state, and when the gases fall back into their normal state, they produce
energy in the form of the magnificent northern and southern polar lights; the auroras.
And if you're wondering about the different colours of the aurora, that's due to different
gases in Earth's atmosphere.
When the CMEs interact with the Oxygen in Earth's atmosphere, they produce a greenish
yellow light or a red light.
And when the CMEs interact with Nitrogen in Earth's atmosphere, they produce a blue light.
A Video Showing the CME interacting with Earth's atmosphere.
Credit: NASA.
We hear a lot of myths about the sun disappearing or the sun engulfing earth, but is there any
truth to that?
Well, as we established before, the sun still has 4.5 billion years burning hydrogen into
helium, so none of us should worry about any mysterious disappearances from the sun.
But I hope you like thought experiments, because we are going to imagine the most extraordinary
event that could ever happen to our sun!
What if the sun,,, got sliced up!?
This is a pretty wild thought, but let us indulge in it and see how it’s gonna turn
out.
The first step is obtaining the right tools, you can’t simply take out the table knife
and travel to space to slice up the Sun!
We would need an extremely sharp tool made out of a material that is ridiculously heat
resistant to sustain the enormous temperature of the Sun at 27 million degrees Fahrenheit
(15 million degrees Celsius).
First, I need to warn you that such a tool doesn't exist, because there simply isn't
a material right now that would not melt under such temperature, but that’s why this is
only a “thought experiment” you gotta be a little imaginative!
The second tool you’re gonna need is also as challenging as the first, which is a custom
made spacecraft to travel up to the sun and also withstand the temperature to perform
the slicing!
We can't send a human for obvious reasons!!
Ready with the two impossibly-obtained tools?
Let’s find out what happens after you slice open the sun.
There are 4 major consequences to slicing only a quarter of the sun moving down through
all its layers till we reach the core.
The first: Harmful radiation!
On earth, we first will have to deal with gamma radiation bursting towards us.
That's because the solar core is now exposed with no solar atmosphere to filter out harmful
radiation from the sun's core.
The second: Deadly cold!
The gamma ray radiation that will rush towards Earth will also lead it to its eternal winter!
Because the radiation will break the bonds between oxygen atoms and nitrogen atoms in
earth’s atmosphere that keep the planet warm, as well as Nitric acid rain pouring
down Earth.
The third: The birth of a new sun!
You might think that a quarter is not a huge portion, but in solar terms, this is a pretty
enormous chunk of the sun.
And after losing all that mass, the sun will never be the same and it will be quite unpredictable
with increase of solar activity because the sun will be in a stage of rebirth.
The forth: Solar system disruption!
The sun accounts for 99.8 percent of the solar system, it keeps all the planets, dwarf planets,
asteroids and other objects in a precise orbit and a perfect harmony between each other.
When quarter of the mass of the sun is sliced, we are looking into a hectic solar system
with different orbits and probably massive collisions between planets and other extraterrestrial
bodies in the solar system.
The earth may not even still be in orbit around the sun, but wander off in the vast darkness
of space.
The sun is the maestro of the solar system, if as much as only a quarter of it goes away,
the whole solar system suffers!
So probably we should only let this experiment be in our imaginations and not act on it anytime
soon.
Voir Plus de Vidéos Connexes
The Sun: Crash Course Astronomy #10
All About the Sun for Kids: Astronomy and Space for Children
Sun 101 | National Geographic
Solar Energy - Nuclear Fusion in the Sun - Simplified Version
The Sun: Facts And History
अगर एक दिन के लिए सूरज गायब हो जाये तो जो होगा आप सोच भी नहीं सकते what if sun went out for one day
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