Sun
From the Simple English Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia that anyone can change
The Sun is the star in our solar system. The planets in our solar system move around the sun in orbits. Our sun can be seen in the sky in the day time. It is a large yellow ball. The sun is basically a very large ball of non-stop explosions. These explosions give off a lot of energy. Even though the sun is very far from the earth, we still feel this energy. The Sun is so bright that it can hurt to look at. The Sun makes light, heat and solar wind. Solar wind moves around the earth outside our atmosphere. It is made of small particles that fly away from the sun. The sun is the main source of energy for life on Earth.
The Sun is at the middle of our solar system. Each planet travels in a round orbit with the sun in the center. Each planet orbits at a different distance from the sun. The orbits of the planets are not circles. They are curves called ellipses. The planets closest to the Sun get more heat. Planets further away are colder.
All life on our planet needs the light energy that comes from our Sun. Plants use solar energy as food so they can grow. Solar energy and photosynthesis cause the green color of many leaves and plants.
In the center of the Sun, in its core, great heat and pressure combine hydrogen gas into helium gas which produces large amounts of energy. This is called atomic fusion.
People can look at the Sun if they use special lenses that make it safe. When they do this, darker spots are sometimes seen on the surface of the Sun; these spots are called sunspots. The number of sunspots on the Sun gets bigger and then smaller in a cycle of about 11 years. The number affects the weather on Earth and can also affect electronics.
[change] The fate of the sun
Scientists called astrophysicists say our Sun is a yellow dwarf star in the middle of its life. In about another 4-5 billion years, they think it will get bigger and become a red giant star. The sun would be 250 times its current size, as big as 1.4 AU, which will be large enough to pass through Earth's current orbit. Earth's fate is still a bit of a mystery. Previous calculations show due to the stellar wind, which drops 30% of the sun's mass, Earth could escape to a higher orbit. But a newer study shows due to the tidal forces, Earth would possibly be vanished itself before the sun continues to get bigger, although the sun will lose mass. Anyways, Earth's ocean and air would long have worn out, even if the sun is still on its main sequence stage. Eventually the sun will shrink into a white dwarf, and eventually fade to black dwarf.
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| The Sun · Mercury · Venus · Earth · Mars · Ceres · Jupiter · Saturn · Uranus · Neptune · Pluto · Eris |
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Planets · Dwarf planets · Moons: Terrestrial · Martian · Jovian · Saturnian · Uranian · Neptunian · Plutonian · Eridian
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Small bodies: Meteoroids · Asteroids/Asteroid moons (Asteroid belt) · Centaurs · TNOs (Kuiper belt/Scattered disc) · Comets (Oort cloud)
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| See also: List of solar system objects |
