Hi.  What exactly is the sunspot system?  I know it is some kind of 11 year cycle where the number of sunspots goes from maximum to minimum.  It is something that, not quite sure.  Can someone please go into deeper detail on what the sunspot system/cycle is?  Please make it as descriptive as possible.  Thanks
208623
The sunspot cycle is caused by irregularly shaped magnetic field lines caused by differences in rotation speed of the surface of the sun and they are also caused by electrical currents caused by the effect of the suns natural magnetic field on the plasma in the surface and corona of the sun. The sunspots are auctually cold spots on the suns surface that are caused by the magnetic field lines repelling charged plasma on the suns surface.
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Do you really mean plants? If so there are quite a few.\nIf you meant planets then most people say 9, although there is a big controversy about what makes something a planet. We have discovered another named Sedna and a couple more that may eventually be called planets.
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This question can't be adaquately addressed in this forum.  There are a couple websites you can refer to for these answers.\n\nhttp://solarsystem.nasa.gov\nhttp://www.nineplanets.org
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1.Sunspots and Solar Flares are two "surface features".\nsunspots are created due to intense magnetic emissions, which lower temperature and prohibit convection, the transfer of heat through fluids (liquids and gases)\nSolar Flares are violent explosions within the atmosphere of the sun, which eject superheated plasma at over 1 million miles an hour. the flares also emit all forms of electromagnetic radiation, from short wave gamma radiation to long wave radio.\n\n2. Up until the mid-19th century, the light parts (terrae) and dark parts (mare) were thought to be land masses and oceans respectively.\nA theory propagated in Nazi Germany was that the moon, and other celestial bodies, were made of ice.\nUp until the 1950's, it was not completely accepted that the features of the moon were impact craters. Now we know that they truly are craters left over from meteor impacts, the youngest of which are hundred of thousands to millions of years old.\n\n3. What Shoemaker meant was, that since the Moon has no atmosphere, there is no chance of erosion or weathering affecting the features.\nCraters and debris pile up, never changing, just being overlapped by newer events.\n\n4. "Sunshine" Is called an Exothermic thermonuclear reaction (nuclear fusion). The exothermic fusion events happen in the core, where hydrogen is converted into helium, helium into carbon, and carbon into iron.\nThe heat energy created by fusion in the core then travels trough the rest of the layers of the sun before escaping as light and other forms of energy.\n\n5. There is a large amount of Iridium found in the fossil layer of around 65 million years ago, and Iridium (very rare on Earth) is abundant in asteroids.\nChicxulub Crater is an ancient impact crater buried underneath the Yucatan Peninsula. Geologic studies have found that the age and chemical composition of the crater corresponds with the hypothesized asteroid that hit Earth 65 million years ago.\n\n6. The moon is tidally locked in orbit around the Earth, so that as it rotates, we rotate, so that the same face is always pointing toward us. The moon rotates and orbits completely around the Earth every four weeks, so that is why we never see the far side. \n\n7. Mercury and Pluto would have the most in common with the Moon, due to their lack of atmosphere. Mars is semi-similar to the Moon, due to the lack of water available to erode the topography.\nEarth and Venus are the least like the Moon, due to their rather violent atmospheres.\n\n8. Contrary to popular belief, the Earth is NOT closer to the sun, any time of the year. Its orbit is described as elliptical, but only because it is not a perfect circle.\nSince the Earth is tilted, currently in Washington it is autumn, but it is spring in Australia.\nThe Northern Hemisphere is angled so the suns rays are less direct in hitting the face of the planet, and the Southern Hemisphere is angled so the rays are more direct.
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Hot topic! Woo-eee. This is one of the creationist versus non-creationist hot potatoes!\n\nHere's why, some creationists say if the sun were shrinking steadily, then a  long time ago, it might have been so big and hot as to turn the surface of the Earth into a pit of fire. So nothing would be alive, say when the Earth was a billion years old.\n\nScientists who study the Sun believe that it is a huge ball of glowing gases and matter. Gravity wants to pull all the stuff together, to shrink it. Heat from nuclear and other reactions in the center of the sun wants to blast it all away, to make it grow.\n\nThe Sun seems to have reached a temporary balance point and so it is the size that it is right now.\n\nSome observations were thought to show that the Sun was shrinking during 6 years of monitoring.\n\nOther studies show that the Sun might sometimes expand and shrink at different times. Just like a candle flame will flare up and then settle down again.\n\nThere are no mainstream scientists claiming that the Sun has been STEADILY shrinking since the beginning. They are only investigating to see what might be happening.\n\nSome astronomy research about the possibility of the Sun shrinking has been used by some groups such as the Institute for Creation Research as evidence for a young Earth. The idea being that this research agrees with their way of reading Holy Scripture. Their view is that the Earth is not very old.\n\nOther writers point out that the astronomy research about the size of the sun is interesting and important work about small-scale, and SHORT-TERM changes in stellar structure. And it may or may not have anything to add to the creation debate.\n\nMost solar research and theory shows that stars are initially formed by coalescing matter -- they shrink. But only until a balance is reached. Then over long periods of time stars might oscillate in size as different types of chemical and nuclear reactions take place. Some stars become super-giants, others zoom outward and then crush inwards to tiny sizes. \n\nThese are just theories based on mathematical models and observations of different sized suns and novas. No one knows for sure in a secular sense.
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The x-ray emission is a very small fraction of the total luminosity of the sun (most of which is in visible light). There is no a priori reason to assume that the x-ray production is closely related to the  bulk luminosity of the sun.\n\nIn fact, the bulk of the x-ray emission is not blackbody emission (the sun glowing because it is hot) at all. \n\nSolar x-rays are generated by magnetic reconnection events (aka solar magnetic storms) in the corona and yes, also associated with photospheric sunspots.  Sunspots have nothing to do with x-rays escaping from the interior of the sun!\n\nBecause these magnetic events are very ephemeral (things build up and then POW, you get a huge burst) the x-ray output is very variable.
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Wow! Thanks for the "heads up".  I wasn't aware of that.  I'm in Florida, so around 2pm here I should be able to set up some equipment so that the whole office can see it.  We have a lot of optical equipment here so it'll be a great opportunity.\n\nFor Jessi:\nYou can take a telescope and point it towards the sun. (Don't look through the telescope)  Then project the sun's image onto a blank sheet of paper and focus until you see the sun's image.  You'll be able to see sunspots and Mercury passing from right to left along the bottom side of the image.  It should last from about 2pm edt until sunset.
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Perpetual motion is the idea that a closed system (with no energy coming in) can continue to produce energy.  When you rely on external forces such as wind, solar, etc... it is referred to as renewable energy.\n\nThe earth spinning around the sun will go on for a very long time, but eventually the system will fail when the sun burns out or slighly before when the sun expands to cover the orbit of the earth... not scheduled any time soon so I wouldn't waste time worrying about it.\n\nThat was a good question though since it points out the difference between these two energy types and addresses an underlying misunderstanding a lot of people have about perpetual motion.
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As time goes on and the sun ages the power output of the sun (or Luminosity to use the technical term) is increasing.  The sun is now about 25% more powerful than it was when it was formed and in about a billion years will be putting out too much power for Earth to be inhabitable (unless we do something like move the Earth away from the sun).\n\nOn short scales most of the changes over the 11 year solar cycle is in the EUV and X-ray parts of the spectrum which are only a minor part of the sun's output (which peaks in the yellow) and are blocked by the upper atmosphere (which does get a lot hotter during solar maximum because of the higher incidence of EUV and X-rays).\n\nA 1% power reduction probably wouldn't do much, the Oceans of the Earth make a very good heatsink and make it very hard to change the temperature of the Earth (they are probably hiding a great deal of the effects of global warming from us).\n\nThe Sun is one of the more stable stars out there although no star is completely stable.
480768
what is the water cycle??
345243
one revolution around the sun, this means the planet is traveling.  think of it like running on a track, the further in you are the faster you get around.  So it's time depends upon how far away it is from the sun.\nThis relates to your second question, the quicker you travel around the sun, the closer you are, the shorter day you have.
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I derive essentially the same function as you do:\nf(x) = 70+50*cos(((2*pi)/11)*(x-1))\n\nThis function is the actual function of sunspot activity with the first maximum occuring in year 1 and maximums occuring every 11 years thereafter including 1750 and 1948.\n\nThe reason your calculator is giving you wrong results is that it is in "degree" mode rather than in "radian" mode. (Don't feel too bad, it took me almost an hour to figure out I had my calculator in the wrong mode too.)
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The sun is about 4.5 billion years old and about 1/3 rd the way through it's expected life. Scientists have given us a glimpse of what to expect as the sun ages.\n\n1.1 billion years or so, it will become 10% brighter. This will cause the earth to become super heated, all life will be destroyed and the oceans will boil away. Then in another 6.5 billion years, it will double in brightness and burn its supply of hydrogen fuel in its core. The sun will swell and become bigger than what we see today.\n\nAt around 8 billion years or so, the size will increase to 166 times and reach as far as Jupiter. The color will be red and it will be known as a Red Giant, but once the hydrogen fuel is depleted and the sun has reached the outer regions of Jupiter, it will start to shrink, losing both energy and brightness as it quickly consumes it's helium in  in 100 million years or so..\n\nThen, at around 12 billion years, the sun will eject much of its outer layers and become a smoldering, collapsed core that scientists would call a White Dwarf, but this is not the end, for it has one more transformation. It eventually will become a Black Hole.\n\nIf you would like to see what the sun will look like when it becomes a White Dwarf, go to:\nhttp://www.physorg.com/newman/gfx/news/m2_9_large.jpg
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The first question is: what powers the sun?\nBlack holes, nuclear fusion,  and gravitation do not explain why the sun is cooler at the surface than in the corona.\n\nThe sun is likely a big electromagnetic ball, sunspots and all, and you just have to open your eyes.  You can see field lines all over it (see links below)\n\nAs Einstein said "The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking " \n\nThe "standard model" doesn't explain a lot of things (superconductivity, gravity, etc) and breaks down under occams razor.  Its needs to be rethought\n\n...so just used some everyday thinking.
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- The Sun is so large, you could fit over one million Earths inside it.\n- The Sun consumes four million tons of hydrogen every second. Even so, it's so vast that our star has enough fuel to keep it shining for another five billion years.\n- The Sun's energy output is estimated to be 386 billion, billion megawatts. So in 15 minutes our Sun radiates as much energy as mankind consumes in all forms, during an entire year.\n\n- The sun is fascinating ! :)
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It doesn't end.  The long count date is 13.00.00.00.00 and the next day is 13.00.00.00.01.  It just POINTS at that date, which is the winter solstice of 2012.  But it's not when the "winter solstice begins"--the solstices (like the equinoxes) are simply points in time. \nRead the book _Maya Cosmogenesis 2012_ by John Major Jenkins for a complete treatment of what's going on with this so-called "end date."\nThe basics: \nDue to precession of the equinoxes, on the morning of 12-21-2012, the sun will come up against the background of a dark spot within the Milky Way. The ancients considered this spot the birth canal of the universe. (In fact it is very close to the center of our galaxy.)  So what happens when the sun comes out the birth canal? It's being born (reborn).  That's what the date points to: the rebirth of the sun.  The sun symbolizes our world.  So we'll have a new world.\nI have a website and 2 blogs about the MesoAmerican calendar system and am writing a book on it.
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What the hell? The sun will not become a neutron star or black hole and we wouldn't freeze! people are seriously making stuff up lol! The sun would first expand into a red giant. This is because it runs out of Hydrogen in it's core and so starts burning Helium, and then other elements. When it expands it will pretty much vapourise the inner planets including the Earth, but this won't happen for another 5 billion years don't worry. After expanding the sun will collapse in, until it becomes a white dwarf. This is a much smaller star (essentially made mostly from the sun's core), and although at first very hot as it's surface area has decreased so the heat is concentrated more into one place, it will slowly cool until it is just a dead star. Stars around 1.4 solar masses or more become neutron stars, as they have enough mass and so enough gravity to squish all the atoms really close together and become very dense when they collapse in on themselves. Stars of 3 solar masses or more collapse so much they become black holes- the gravity completely takes control and squishes the entire star into a point of infinite density from which not even light can escape! But the Sun is not massive enough to do either of these. It is about an average sized star.