Maybe five billion years from now, the Sun will expand hugely so the question is whether Earth will survive that where as Mercury and Venus are toast. (Science Daily: Will Earth still exist 5 billion years from now?)
"Five billion years from now, the Sun will have grown into a red giant star, more than a hundred times larger than its current size," says Professor Leen Decin from the KU Leuven Institute of Astronomy. "It will also experience an intense mass loss through a very strong stellar wind. The end product of its evolution, 7 billion years from now, will be a tiny white dwarf star. This will be about the size of the Earth, but much heavier: one tea spoon of white dwarf material weighs about 5 tons."
This metamorphosis will have a dramatic impact on the planets of our Solar System. Mercury and Venus, for instance, will be engulfed in the giant star and destroyed.
It seems they don't really know what will happen but how about if these researchers hook up with recent research which apparently gives telescopes the ability to image planets around other stars. (Ithaka: Watching a Game of Football ... on Another Planet)
Here's a direct link to Science Daily: New telescope chip offers clear view of alien planets
This is so sci fi already relative to my own life that extending it doesn't gain anything.
"Five billion years from now, the Sun will have grown into a red giant star, more than a hundred times larger than its current size," says Professor Leen Decin from the KU Leuven Institute of Astronomy. "It will also experience an intense mass loss through a very strong stellar wind. The end product of its evolution, 7 billion years from now, will be a tiny white dwarf star. This will be about the size of the Earth, but much heavier: one tea spoon of white dwarf material weighs about 5 tons."
This metamorphosis will have a dramatic impact on the planets of our Solar System. Mercury and Venus, for instance, will be engulfed in the giant star and destroyed.
- Science Daily
You're probably not quivering in fear and planning to build a bomb shelter since there's a bit of time until this happens. I see it as evolution in action and it's something of an extension of my ol' Dad's book, the "Dimensions of Death," which sought to show everything dies and from that hopefully comes a deeper experience in the meaning of the concept.
The Death Parties my ol' Dad threw were famous, I mean, notorious around the campus. Those were some crazy, I mean, wonderful, times.
The Death Parties my ol' Dad threw were famous, I mean, notorious around the campus. Those were some crazy, I mean, wonderful, times.
"But the fate of the Earth is still uncertain," continues Decin. "We already know that our Sun will be bigger and brighter, so that it will probably destroy any form of life on our planet. But will the Earth's rocky core survive the red giant phase and continue orbiting the white dwarf?"
- Science Daily
It seems they don't really know what will happen but how about if these researchers hook up with recent research which apparently gives telescopes the ability to image planets around other stars. (Ithaka: Watching a Game of Football ... on Another Planet)
Here's a direct link to Science Daily: New telescope chip offers clear view of alien planets
This is so sci fi already relative to my own life that extending it doesn't gain anything.
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