RSSInteresting Facts about Astronomy
Mar 30
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Astronomy is an interesting science to most people because it is stuffed with many fun astronomy facts. Everything from the size and temperature of our own star, the Sun, to the make-up of distant planets has been recorded. All of this information can be retold to entertain and enlighten your friends.
The Sun is a fantastic source of astronomy fun facts. Our own star, which supplies us with all our heat and light is between 91 and 94.5 million miles from Earth. It’s not that nobody has measured the exact distance. It’s because the Earth revolves around the Sun in an elliptical, uneven, orbit, so the distance varies depending on where the Earth is situated in that orbit.
The Sun is only an average size star, yet it’s size is another terrific source of astronomy fun facts. As normal as it is, it accounts for about 98% of all the matter in our solar system. Even with the massive planet of Jupiter on our side, we’re still only a small 2% of non Sun material.
It would take the diameter of about 100 Earths to stretch across this average Sun. The solar winds created by the Sun extends to about 50 times the distance from the Earth to the Sun. Or put another way, those solar winds reach out about 50 AU’s. An AU being the distance from the Earth to the Sun, which is quite an fantastic fact, isn’t it?.
What about astronomy fun facts that don’t have anything at all to do with the Sun then? How about the Moon? It’s the only object that man has walked on except the Earth so far. And one man actually travelled to the Moon but has never left it. Dr. Eugene Shoemaker loved the Moon but was not found acceptable as an astronaut. After his death, he was cremated and his ashes were scattered over the Moon by the Lunar Prospector spacecraft in 1999.
There are many more astronomy fun facts about the Moon. It’s where what may become the oldest footprint known to man. Neil Armstrong’s giant leap for mankind left a footprint or shoe print in the Moon’s dust that will likely still be visible in 10 million years time.
Lots of people, in fact about 13% of those polled in 1988, still thought the Moon is made of cheese. And finally, the suits worn by the Moon-walking astronauts weighed 180 pounds on Earth but only 30 pounds on the Moon, because of the Moon’s reduced gravity. Talk about losing weight, eh?
Astronomy fun facts aren’t limited to our close astronomical neighbours. Looking at stars is like looking into the past. Some of the stars we see nowadays in the night sky are so far away that their light takes a million years to reach Earth. Some of the stars you see may literally be images of stars a million years old that aren’t even there in the present. There are over 1 x 10 ^22 stars in the universe. That’s a 1 followed by 22 zeros. And all their planets. The number is really quite staggering.
There are thousands of astronomy fun facts that we could relate. But, unfortunately, this article can not be that long. So, please, walk out there at night, look upwards and learn more about astronomy for yourself.
Interested in astronomy, then please pop along to our website at: Astronomy Today
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