How will the sun luminosity and temperature change as it ages?

Answer 1

the sun gets brighter and the temperature increases

Answer 2

This may be a trick question, so let's dive in by saying that both answers are correct. Now all we have to do is explain why, and we're ready to do that now. Put on your thinking cap and let's get busy.

The sun is converting hydrogen to helium at a rate that staggers the mind. The numbers overwhelm many investigators the first time that they encounter them. At any rate, when hydrogen is fused into helium, the mass of the "finished product" here is less than the masses of the individual ingredients. And we'd better explain that to defend our answer.

When lighter nuclei are fused together to form heavier nuclei in fusion reactions, some of the mass of the constituent nuclei is converted into the binding energy that holds the new nucleus together. Call that force holding the nucleus together residual strong force (strong interaction), nuclear glue, or any other name, but it comes from the conversion of mass into energy. The term mass deficit is applied to the "drop in mass" that we observe in fission. What is happening here is that the sun is getting smaller in mass every second that it is burning. And it will continue to do so throughout its life. Ah, but there's more.

As the sun gets less massive, there is less gravity to hold this massive fusion machine together. It won't just "fly apart" because gravity is still extremely great, but as the sun's gravity decreases because it is losing mass, the sun is getting larger in size as it ages. You may have encountered the idea that the sun will get "redder" nearer the end of its life, and that it will "expand" to the point that all the inner planets will be incinerated. That ideas is true, and that's the long and short of it. All the investigating you'd care to do will just support these basic ideas, and links can be found below to related questions that support what is set down here.

Answer 3

In five billion years the Sun will get large enough to swallow the Earth, however, this is not a direct process, nor a concern today. Right now the Sun is growing gradually brighter and in a few million years this might be a concern, however the Sun is currently getting smaller AND more active as judged by sunspot numbers. So the best answer is see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_variation Solar variation is not believed by the majority of researchers to cause a significant amount of measured global warming, but the issue has not been completely decided.

Answer 4

The sun does NOT get hotter and more luminous as it gets older. It gets hotter and more luminous for PART of its life cycle. When its primary and secondary fuel gets spent, it will subside to a white dwarf, faint and relatively cool as there is not enough energy to produce the fusion that kept it going through the hotter stages.

Answer 5

Technically, no; the Sun isn't "alive" as we understand life, so it can't "die". But it will, someday, change so completely that we might as well THINK of it as "death".

The Sun is a medium-sized star, about 4.5 billion years old, and will exist more or less as it does now for another 4 billion years, give or take a few hundred million years. At that point, when the supply of hydrogen is less than it is now and the amount of helium "ash" in the nuclear furnace is much greater than it is now, the helium will begin to interfere with the hydrogen fusion, and the Sun will start to go out. It will shrink a little, until the pressure and temperature in the core are much greater than they are now, and then the Sun will burst into new "life" as it begins fusing the helium into heavier elements such as carbon and oxygen. The Sun will expand into a red giant, and the inner planets will be consumed; Mercury and Venus for sure, and possibly Earth itself.

If the Sun were much more massive than it is, it might go supernova and explode, becoming a neutron star or a black hole. But the Sun isn't big enough for that; it will continue, shrinking into a white dwarf and eventually a brown dwarf star, slowly shrinking and cooling. "Death", of a sort, perhaps.

Answer 6

As of today (May 24, 2012), nothing has changed. The Sun is no brighter today

than it was last week or last year.

Perhaps you're in an area that has recently had some heavy rain and it's now clear?

Rain can clear dust and pollen out of the air. If your air was particularly dusty before,

the difference can be dramatic.

Answer 7

Any stars that does this is known as a nova or a supernova. One of the most recent nearby supernovas was a star named Sanduleak -69 202°. It was in the Large Magellanic Cloud, and the supernova became known as SN1987A.

Answer 8

A Flare.

Our Sun routinely experiences solar flares, in which titanic explosions on the Sun toss vast quantities of ionized gas and plasma into space. These follow the lines of magnetic flux into space, and fall back to the Sun. Flares are far more common during the active periods of the 11-year sunspot cycle. (This cycle is currently at a minimum, and is expected to begin increasing very soon. The next peak ought to occur in 2012 or 2013. ) Flares sometimes launch streams of charged particles at the Earth, resulting in electromagnetic storms which can disrupt radio transmissions and electrical power systems.

Answer 9

astronomers can measure the speed with which stars and galaxies are moving. Most of them are moving away from us. the farther away a galaxy is, the faster it appears to be moving away. this means that the universe is getting bigger.

Answer 10

Because of Universal Warming, the sun is getting brighter/hotter. Eventually, the sun will be able to burn through our corneas and possibly our retinas. This means that we are going to have to wear more Protective Technologies, like Shutter Shades, blind people glasses, and flickr blockrs. In an effort to reduce time spent out during daylight hours, men and women will be forced to dress in black & wear humble loafers. We will carry fannypacks that aren't strapped around our fannies full of nourishment & emergency medical supplies.