How The Sun Keeps Shining?
Looking at the shining Sun during the day and the stars that shine at night, we look at the same kind of objects. One does not believe readily.
In actual the Sun is also a star. It is nearest to earth. Life’s existence depends on the Sun. It is the sun’s heat that has caused life to originate on the earth. The green plants, the animals, and human beings could not have existed without sunlight.
The Sun is placed about 148,800,000 Kilometers from the earth. Imagine the bulk of the Sun. The volume of the Sun is about 1,300,000 times that of the earth. The earth is a solid body, while the Sun is not.
We have known that the temperature on the Sun’s surface is about 6100°c. This temperature is adequate to change the metal or rocks into a gas. The Sun is a ball of fire.
For centuries people believed, the heat and light of the Sun were due to burning. But, the Sun has been hot for hundreds of, millions of years. Nothing can remain burning for that long period of time. Scientists have come to believe that the heat and light of the Sun are the results of a process similar to the one in an atom bomb. The Sun changes matter into energy.
Burning changes matter from one form to another. So, this is different. When the matter is changed into energy, very little matter is needed to produce a tremendous amount of energy. About 25 gms of matter could produce heat that is enough to melt about a million tonnes of rock or metal.
Believing scientific research, the Sun is shining due to the continuous change of matter into energy. Only one percent of the Sun’s mass would provide sufficient energy to keep it hot for 150 billion years.