SUN FACTS
ASTRONOMY 101
LECTURE
SUN FACTS
• A ball of hot gases
• Made up of
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70% hydrogen
28% helium
1.5% carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen, and
0.5% all other elements
• Temperature: 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit at the
surface
• Temperature: 27,000,000 degrees Fahrenheit at the
center
SUN DISTANCES
• The average distance from the Earth to the Sun is
93,000,000 miles
• It takes light eight and a half minutes to travel from
the Sun to the Earth
• The diameter of the Sun is:
• 870,000 miles
• 109 times larger than the Earth's
• The volume of the Sun is big enough to hold over 1
million Earths
LOOKING AT THE SUN?
• DO NOT LOOK AT THE SUN, EVEN WITH DARK OR
SMOKED GLASSES.
• DO NOT LOOK AT THE SUN WITH BINOCULARS OR
SMALL TELESCOPES.
• YOU CAN DAMAGE YOUR EYES!
NEVER LOOKED AT THE SUN DIRECTLY
ULYSSES SPACECRAFT HISTORIC
MISSION OF DISCOVERY
• Joint effort of NASA and the European Space
Agency
• Launched October 1990
• First spacecraft to orbit the Sun's North and South
poles
• June 30, 2009: Mission team received a NASA Group
Achievement Award
• June 10, 2009: Became the longest-running ESAoperated spacecraft
• overtaking the International Ultraviolet Explorer which
logged 18 years and 246 days of operations
• http://ulysses.jpl.nasa.gov/