by neufer » Mon Dec 09, 2019 10:19 pm
Ann wrote: ↑Mon Dec 09, 2019 7:25 pm
The main point to me is that the Sun is slingshotting plasma out of its corona. Yep, the Sun is losing weight all right! Not that that is a surprise, because all stars do.
But anyway, the Sun is losing weight and the Earth is gaining weight, by eating all those meteors that fall into the atmosphere of the Earth all the time.
It all adds up, I suppose.
The Sun is
mostly losing weight by slingshotting
photons & neutrinos out of the solar system.
and the Earth is also losing weight by leaking hydrogen & helium.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_mass wrote:
<<The current best estimate for Earth mass is M
⊕ = 5.9722×10
24 kg, with a standard uncertainty of 6×10
20 kg. Earth's mass is variable, subject to both gain and loss due to the accretion of in-falling material, including micrometeorites and cosmic dust and the loss of hydrogen and helium gas, respectively. The combined effect is a net loss of material, estimated at 5.5×10
7 kg (54,000 long tons) per year.
This loss amount is 10−17 of the total earth mass. The 5.5×10
7 kg annual net loss is essentially due to 100,000 tons lost due to atmospheric escape, and an average of 45,000 tons gained from in-falling dust and meteorites.
Mass loss is due to atmospheric escape of gases. About 95,000 tons of hydrogen per year (3 kg/s) and 1,600 tons of helium per year are lost through atmospheric escape. The main factor in mass gain is in-falling material, cosmic dust, meteors, etc. are the most significant contributors to Earth's increase in mass. The sum of material is estimated to be 37,000 to 78,000 tons annually, although this can vary significantly; to take an extreme example, the Chicxulub impactor, with a midpoint mass estimate of 2.3×10
17 kg, added 900 million times that annual dustfall amount to the Earth's mass in a single event.
An additional loss due to spacecraft on escape trajectories has been estimated at 65 tons per year since the mid-20th century. Earth lost about 3473 tons in the initial 53 years of the space age, but the trend is currently decreasing. Additional changes in mass are due to the mass–energy equivalence principle, although these changes are relatively negligible. Mass loss due to the combination of nuclear fission and natural radioactive decay is estimated to amount to 16 tons per year.>>
https://www.forbes.com/sites/briankoberlein/2018/04/10/the-sun-is-losing-mass-and-getting-larger-at-the-same-time/#3933a8364ead wrote:
The Sun Is Losing Mass, And Getting Larger At The Same Time
Brian Koberlein: Apr 10, 2018.
<<The Sun's light is produced by fusion in the Sun's core. Hydrogen atoms combine to produce helium and light. The light is produced because the mass of a helium atom is slightly smaller than the mass of the four hydrogen atoms that formed it. As Einstein first pointed out, mass and energy can transform into each other, so the loss of mass means a gain of energy in the form of light. The light radiates from the Sun, warming our Earth, but that also means over time the Sun loses mass. The Sun consumes mass to produce light.
As the Sun loses mass its gravitational pull on the planets weakens slightly. The Sun can't hold the planets as strongly as it used to, so the planets drift a bit further away from the Sun. At least that's the theory. The shift of the planets is so small that it's difficult to measure. There have been some studies that seemed to see the effect with Earth, but the result isn't particularly strong. The usual method of determining planetary distance is to bounce radio signals off them, and it's difficult to do it precisely enough to determine the Sun's changing mass.
There is a much better way to measure the position of planets. Simply put a spacecraft in orbit around it. When the Cassini spacecraft was placed in orbit around Saturn, astronomers used radio signals from Cassini to measure the position of Saturn accurate to within a mile. We can do this because we know exactly what signal comes from the spacecraft, so any shift in that signal tells us how the spacecraft moves. When the Messenger spacecraft was placed in orbit, astronomers used the same technique to measure the position of Mercury. Using seven years of data they could also determine how Mercury's motion changed over time. They did it precisely enough to observe the weakening of the Sun's gravitational tug. They found that the Sun's pull is weakening by about 6.13 trillionths of a percent per year.
This loss amount is ~6,130×10−17 of the total Solar mass and agrees with estimates of the Sun's mass loss due to core fusion: ~4,000×10−17 plus solar wind: ~2,500×10−17.>>
[quote=Ann post_id=297788 time=1575919549 user_id=129702]
The main point to me is that the Sun is slingshotting plasma out of its corona. Yep, the Sun is losing weight all right! Not that that is a surprise, because all stars do.
But anyway, the Sun is losing weight and the Earth is gaining weight, by eating all those meteors that fall into the atmosphere of the Earth all the time.
It all adds up, I suppose.[/quote]
The Sun is [b][u][color=#FF0000]mostly losing[/color][/u][/b] weight by slingshotting [b][u][color=#0000FF]photons & neutrinos[/color][/u][/b] out of the solar system.
[size=120]and the Earth is [b][u][color=#FF0000]also losing[/color][/u][/b] weight by leaking hydrogen & helium.[/size]
[quote=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_mass]
<<The current best estimate for Earth mass is M[sub]⊕[/sub] = 5.9722×10[sup]24[/sup] kg, with a standard uncertainty of 6×10[sup]20[/sup] kg. Earth's mass is variable, subject to both gain and loss due to the accretion of in-falling material, including micrometeorites and cosmic dust and the loss of hydrogen and helium gas, respectively. The combined effect is a net loss of material, estimated at 5.5×10[sup]7[/sup] kg (54,000 long tons) per year. [b][u][color=#0000FF]This loss amount is 10[sup]−17[/sup] of the total earth mass.[/color][/u][/b] The 5.5×10[sup]7[/sup] kg annual net loss is essentially due to 100,000 tons lost due to atmospheric escape, and an average of 45,000 tons gained from in-falling dust and meteorites.
Mass loss is due to atmospheric escape of gases. About 95,000 tons of hydrogen per year (3 kg/s) and 1,600 tons of helium per year are lost through atmospheric escape. The main factor in mass gain is in-falling material, cosmic dust, meteors, etc. are the most significant contributors to Earth's increase in mass. The sum of material is estimated to be 37,000 to 78,000 tons annually, although this can vary significantly; to take an extreme example, the Chicxulub impactor, with a midpoint mass estimate of 2.3×10[sup]17[/sup] kg, added 900 million times that annual dustfall amount to the Earth's mass in a single event.
An additional loss due to spacecraft on escape trajectories has been estimated at 65 tons per year since the mid-20th century. Earth lost about 3473 tons in the initial 53 years of the space age, but the trend is currently decreasing. Additional changes in mass are due to the mass–energy equivalence principle, although these changes are relatively negligible. Mass loss due to the combination of nuclear fission and natural radioactive decay is estimated to amount to 16 tons per year.>>[/quote][quote=https://www.forbes.com/sites/briankoberlein/2018/04/10/the-sun-is-losing-mass-and-getting-larger-at-the-same-time/#3933a8364ead]
The Sun Is Losing Mass, And Getting Larger At The Same Time
Brian Koberlein: Apr 10, 2018.
<<The Sun's light is produced by fusion in the Sun's core. Hydrogen atoms combine to produce helium and light. The light is produced because the mass of a helium atom is slightly smaller than the mass of the four hydrogen atoms that formed it. As Einstein first pointed out, mass and energy can transform into each other, so the loss of mass means a gain of energy in the form of light. The light radiates from the Sun, warming our Earth, but that also means over time the Sun loses mass. The Sun consumes mass to produce light.
As the Sun loses mass its gravitational pull on the planets weakens slightly. The Sun can't hold the planets as strongly as it used to, so the planets drift a bit further away from the Sun. At least that's the theory. The shift of the planets is so small that it's difficult to measure. There have been some studies that seemed to see the effect with Earth, but the result isn't particularly strong. The usual method of determining planetary distance is to bounce radio signals off them, and it's difficult to do it precisely enough to determine the Sun's changing mass.
There is a much better way to measure the position of planets. Simply put a spacecraft in orbit around it. When the Cassini spacecraft was placed in orbit around Saturn, astronomers used radio signals from Cassini to measure the position of Saturn accurate to within a mile. We can do this because we know exactly what signal comes from the spacecraft, so any shift in that signal tells us how the spacecraft moves. When the Messenger spacecraft was placed in orbit, astronomers used the same technique to measure the position of Mercury. Using seven years of data they could also determine how Mercury's motion changed over time. They did it precisely enough to observe the weakening of the Sun's gravitational tug. They found that the Sun's pull is weakening by about 6.13 trillionths of a percent per year. [b][color=#0000FF]This loss amount is ~6,130×10[sup]−17[/sup] of the total Solar mass and agrees with estimates of the Sun's mass loss due to core fusion: ~4,000×10[sup]−17[/sup] plus solar wind: ~2,500×10[sup]−17[/sup].[/color][/b]>>[/quote]