Not only is the Sun the central star of our star system, it is also massive compared to our home planet. Here are the facts.
The Sun has enough gravitational force to keep planets like Earth, Mercury, and Mars in their orbits. But how big is the Sun compared to the Earth? Let's take a look at the different comparison sizes.
Diameter and circumference
The diameter of the Sun is about 1.4 million kilometers. For comparison: the Earth's diameter is about 12,742 km. This means that the diameter of the Sun is about 109 times the diameter of the Earth.
And the scope? If a spaceship were to orbit the Sun, it would have to travel 4,379,000 kilometers to complete one orbit. The spacecraft was supposed to orbit the Earth once after 40,075 kilometers.
Size and mass
a fan? Then take a look at the size of the sun. Our star is about 1.3 million times larger than the Earth. This means that our planet is 1.3 million times proportional to the Sun.
Also, the mass of the Sun is greater than the mass of the Earth. The Sun is about 333,000 times heavier than our planet.
This is how long the sun has been around
Here are some additional facts about our star. The Sun formed about 4.6 billion years ago from a huge cloud of material. It took about 30 million years for the individual components of this cloud to form our Sun.
Given his advanced age, our star is almost halfway through his life. Astronomers estimate that it will continue burning for about 5 billion years before expanding into a red giant and eventually shrinking into a so-called white dwarf.
How is the sun formed? Our star is composed of about 74 percent hydrogen and about 24 percent helium. All other elements such as carbon and nitrogen make up the remaining 2 percent of the composition.
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