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| The Sun and solar flares to scale - NASA |
Don't you just love beautiful sunny days with warmth on your skin and rays of light through the trees! Do you ever stop and think about what the sun is? How big it is? The fact it's just an enomous ball of gas literally on fire?
I do, properly more then most people, because the process of fusion energy is pretty damn cool once you know how it works!
Fusion first begins when the core of dust/gas ball reaches 15 million degrees celsius. Majority of the gas in the core is hydrogen atoms, which begin the fusion process. Two hydrogen atoms fuse together undergoing weak interaction which transmutes one proton to a neutron. This forms a hydrogen 2 atom. This newly created hydrogen2 fuses with a
single hydrogen atom, emitting a gamma ray and creating Helium 3. Finally two Helium 3 fuse together emitting two normal hydrogen atoms and a Helium 4.
This process continues for millions of years
because of the continual creation of hydrogen atoms. The gamma rays that are
released from this process will go on to continually interact with electrons
and protons, creating the heat energy.
There you have it! Next time you walk outside into the Sun enjoy the beautiful process of nuclear fusion.
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