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Nuclear fusion, specifically the proton-proton chain, with somewhat less than 2% being the CNO (carbon-nitrogen-oxygen) cycle, takes place in the Sun's core. At a temperature of 13.6 million K, in each p-p reaction, four protons (hydrogen nuclei) are fused together to form two protons and two neutrons (helium nuclei) with two quarks being converted from up to down to facilitate two of the protons becoming neutrons.

There is a loss of residual binding energy when this happens, which is released as gamma rays, other particles such as neutrinos, and energy to raise the temperature of the core.

It is estimated that about 4.26 million metric tons of mass is converted to energy each second, yielding about about 3.846 x 1026 joules per second, or about 9.192 x 1010 megatons of TNT per second in equivalent energy.

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14y ago

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