Monday, 8 August 2011

Starry err

Mistakes were made; made by me.  Fusion in stars near the end of their life fuse three Helium atoms together making other more complex atoms like beryllium, oxygen and carbon, this is called a triple alpha reaction.  The fusion of Hydrogen is called hydrogen fusion . . . Duh on my part.  I learned some interesting facts too.  Hydrogen fusion is very efficient, 0.7% of the mass of four hydrogen is lost to create one helium.  This lost mass is converted directly into energy via, E=MC2.  One gram of hydrogen fused together makes 0.993 grams of helium and enough energy to move 64 tones up one kilometer.  That would be enough power to put a small sized satellite into Earth orbit . . . So cool!   

1 comment:

  1. And the temperature within the Sun's core is in millions of degrees, not billions or trillions.

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