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Solar maximum is the regular period of greatest solar activity during the Sun 's 11-year solar cycle. During solar maximum, large numbers of sunspots appear, and the solar irradiance output grows by about 0.07%. [2] On average, the solar cycle takes about 11 years to go from one solar maximum to the next, with duration observed varying from 9 ...
The Sun then shrinks to around 10 times its current size and 50 times the luminosity, with a temperature a little lower than today. It will then have reached the red clump or horizontal branch, but a star of the Sun's metallicity does not evolve blueward along the horizontal branch. Instead, it just becomes moderately larger and more luminous ...
Sunspot numbers also change over long periods. For example, during the period known as the modern maximum from 1900 to 1958 the solar maxima trend of sunspot count was upwards; for the following 60 years the trend was mostly downwards. [30] Overall, the Sun was last as active as the modern maximum over 8,000 years ago. [31]
Galactic year. The galactic year, also known as a cosmic year, is the duration of time required for the Sun to orbit once around the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. [1] One galactic year is approximately 225 million Earth years. [2] The Solar System is traveling at an average speed of 230 km/s (828,000 km/h) or 143 mi/s (514,000 mph) within its ...
Orbital period. ~230 million years [ 10 ] The Solar System[ d ] is the gravitationally bound system of the Sun and the objects that orbit it. [ 11 ] It was formed about 4.6 billion years ago when a dense region of a molecular cloud collapsed, forming the Sun and a protoplanetary disc.
Earth's orbit. Earth orbits the Sun at an average distance of 149.60 million km (92.96 million mi), or 8.317 light-minutes, [1] in a counterclockwise direction as viewed from above the Northern Hemisphere. One complete orbit takes 365.256 days (1 sidereal year), during which time Earth has traveled 940 million km (584 million mi). [2]
The solar cycle, also known as the solar magnetic activity cycle, sunspot cycle, or Schwabe cycle, is a nearly periodic 11-year change in the Sun 's activity measured in terms of variations in the number of observed sunspots on the Sun's surface.
Taken on 20 October 1968 from Apollo 7. Sunlight is a portion of the electromagnetic radiation given off by the Sun, in particular infrared, visible, and ultraviolet light. On Earth, sunlight is scattered and filtered through Earth's atmosphere as daylight when the Sun is above the horizon.