1) The temperature at the Sun’s core is approximately 15 million K. Stars must a
ID: 288790 • Letter: 1
Question
1) The temperature at the Sun’s core is approximately 15 million K. Stars must achieve a core temperature of roughly 10 million K in order for hydrogen fusion to begin.
a) Why does hydrogen fusion inside stellar cores require such high temperatures?
b) Given the Sun’s radius, calculate how long it would take a photon produced in the Sun’s core to exit the photosphere if it could travel straight out of the Sun at the speed of light (c = 3 x 108 m/s).
c) Photons produced in the Sun’s core instead take as much as a million years to exit the Sun. Why?
Solar Data Mass: 2 x 1030 kg Radius: 7 x 108 m Luminosity: 3.8 x 1026 J/s Masses of Atomic Nuclei Hydrogen: 1.673 x 1027 kg Helium: 6.643 x 1027 kgExplanation / Answer
a) Hydrogen fusion inside stellar cores require very high temperatures beacuse fusion of hydrogen atoms require their nucleus to fuse together to give an atom of helium and enormeous amount of energy but the nucleus which contains protons and neutrons (out of which protons are the charged entities) exert repulsive force as there is same charge on the nucleus of both the atom and hence in order to overcome this force large amout of energy which is produced by the virtue of extreme heat and extreme pressure is required for these fusion reactions.
b) Using the formula: Time = distance/speed
time = 7 x 108/3 x 108
time =2.3333 seconds ( but this is not the actual case.)
c) The photons which are produced in the Sun’s core due to fusion reaction can take as much as a million years to exit the Sun because the photon produced can head in any direction and if we'll see the net movement (produced by vector addition of this haphazard moment of photon) of these photons then we find that they can take million of years to exit sun's core.
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