The Sun and Stars

The rays the sun release are...

• x-rays
• ultraviolet rays
• radio waves
• heat rays
• light rays
• gamma rays

The layers of the sun are... (outer to inner)

• corona
• chromosphere
• photosphere
• radiation zone
• core

The sun's diameter is 1,392,700 km or 865,000 mi.

The sun's 150,000,000 kilometers, or 93,000,000 miles away from Earth.

Light takes 8 minutes to reach Earth from the Sun.

Less than 2 billionths of energy from the sun reaches Earth, yet without it there would be no life on Earth.

The surface temperature of the Sun is 5500 Celsius, or 10,000 Fahrenheit.

The core temperature of the Sun is 15,000,000 Celsius or 27,000,000 Fahrenheit.

Heat and light energy are produced by nuclear reactions within the Sun.

The closest star besides the Sun is called Proxima Centauri.

Any stars seen without a telescope belong to the Milky Way galaxy.

A light year is the distance light travels in a year, about 9.6 trillion kilometers.

Proxima Centauri is 4.3 light years away.

Betelgeuse, a giant red star, is 200 light years away.

Rigel, a supergiant star, is 540 light years away.

Both Rigel and Betelgeuse are in the constellation Orion.

The farthest stars are in galaxies billions of light years away.

The brightest star in the night sky is Sirius, also known as the Dog Star.

Sirius is part of the constellation Canis Major. It is 8.8 light years away, along with having the first magnitude.

A white dwarf star is so dense that one cubic inch of its matter would weigh 1 ton on Earth.

A nova is a star that suddenly increases in its brightness but returns to its regular magnitude, or brightness.

A supernova is the same, but increases in brightness much more and never returns to its original brightness.

New stars are constantly forming in space.

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