Abstract
The Sun is important to astronomers for two reasons. The first is that it is Earth’s only natural “power station,” producing the light and heat essential to life on our planet. Without the Sun, Earth would be more or less a frozen ball of rock, with no atmosphere, no weather, no life and no people. The Sun can also be harmful to us, because it emits huge quantities of radiation that would be fatal to humans and all living matter, were our planet not protected from it by a thick atmosphere and powerful magnetic field. But intense bursts of solar activity can still harm communications and electrical power systems, so we need to keep a constant watch on the Sun so that we are forewarned of its next powerful outburst. We also need to understand it so that we can predict future activity and its likely consequences.
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Notes
- 1.
Kelvin is the temperature measured from “absolute zero,” approximately −273°C, and is the temperature scale most commonly used by astronomers. To convert from Kelvin to Celsius, subtract 273°. At the huge temperatures we are dealing with in the Sun, the difference between Kelvin and Celsius is insignificant.
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© 2012 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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Macdonald, L. (2012). Our Sun. In: How to Observe the Sun Safely. Patrick Moore's Practical Astronomy Series. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-3825-0_1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-3825-0_1
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