Category Archives: SolarSystem

The Sun

Posted on March 12, 2019 by calebglotta

Everyone knows the sun is what gives us light, much of our heat, and is vital to life on Earth, however there are many intriguing aspects that people do not know. The sun was formed four and a half billion years ago from the gas of a collapsing space cloud. This cloud continued to contract … Continue reading The Sun → Continue reading →

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Understanding Our Sun

Posted on March 12, 2019 by dayvon

On August 12, 2018 the Parker Solar Probe was launched. The mission of this probe is to investigate activity in the Sun’s corona in order to provide us with information that can help us understand more about the star and Earth’s connection to it. Analyzing the data being sent back will allow scientists to potentially … Continue reading Understanding Our Sun → Continue reading →

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Terraforming

Posted on March 12, 2019 by peytonbrown4560

Considering all the horrible ways that either humans or otherwise could end life on Earth, the idea of inhabiting another world seems pretty nifty. The only issue with that is we need oxygen and for our soft squishy skin to not get fried by intense sunlight. So, the prospects of getting off our planet for … Continue reading Terraforming Continue reading →

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Nuclear Fusion

Posted on March 12, 2019 by anna_h

The Sun generates energy by fusing hydrogen into helium due to a process known as nuclear fusion. Fusion occurs within the Sun because the plasma in the solar core is full of hot gases that collide with one another at extremely high speeds. In most cases, electromagnetic repulsion forces deflect the nuclei of the two … Continue reading Nuclear Fusion Continue reading →

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Sun Facts

Posted on March 12, 2019 by richardficek

The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System and is a nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma. Its diameter is about 1.39 million kilometers (864,000 miles) – 109 times that of Earth – and its mass is about 330,000 times that of Earth. The Sun accounts for about 99.86% of the total mass of the Solar System and its … Continue reading Sun Facts → Continue reading →

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Cars and the Greenhouse Effect

Posted on March 12, 2019 by Campbell Flower

Earth experiences a warming through the greenhouse effect: the absorption and re-emission of light from the planet’s surface by compounds in the atmosphere such as carbon dioxide and water. Greenhouse gases are necessary for keeping life on Earth warm enough to survive, but an increase in their concentration has led to a undesirable heating of … Continue reading Cars and the Greenhouse Effect → Continue reading →

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Gravity and Sun Size

Posted on March 12, 2019 by JSpin

Gravity as the Driving Force The Sun has a mass of 2 * 10^30 kg. Gravity exerts a compression force on the Sun proportional to this immense mass. So why doesn’t the sun collapse under the weight of its gravity? The pressure of the center of the Sun is about 340 billion times the air … Continue reading Gravity and Sun Size → Continue reading →

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Gravity Waves

Posted on March 11, 2019 by Jonathan Roberts

Venus is the unfortunate victim of a runaway greenhouse effect. Not only does this make the planet uninhabitable, it also causes a tremendous degree of difficulty in observing the planet’s surface. However, there are many interesting things to gain from Venus by just looking at the atmosphere, including a massive gravity wave. Gravity waves in … Continue reading Gravity Waves → Continue reading →

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Nuclear Fusion in the Sun

Posted on March 11, 2019 by richardtli

Nuclear fusion is the process in which the Sun and all other stars generate energy through the combination of light atoms into heavier ones. The nuclear fusion in most stars is carried out in proton-proton fusion. In the first step, two protons fused together to create a proton-neutron core and emitting a neutrino and positron. … Continue reading Nuclear Fusion in the Sun → Continue reading →

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An Artificial Sun

Posted on March 11, 2019 by Campbell Flower

In November of 2018, Chinese scientists announced their work on an artificial sun. Their goal is to develop the same nuclear fusion process that occurs within the sun (the conversion of hydrogen into helium) on Earth to ultimately create a source of unlimited clean energy. One of the biggest challenges of this project is to … Continue reading An Artificial Sun → Continue reading →

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