Quenching the Sun, for Fun
Friday, August 21, 2009 - 15:07
in Astronomy & Space
My kids asked me if there was enough water in the universe to quench the Sun. I voted yes, but of course science isn't about voting, but about verifiable facts. So now the explanation. The Sun has a mass of around a third of a million Earths. Stealing a figure from MadSci.org, the mass of water on the Earth is 1/4400 the total mass. We'll say we need enough water to completely douse every atom in that fusion-burning puppy we call Sol, so we'll need... 4400 * 0.3 * a million Earths. This works out neatly to just over a billion Earths, to get enough water to douse the Sun. read more
